IPNEWS: The Civil Society Working on Land Rights Reform (CSOWGLR) has raised ‘red flag’ over President Joseph Nyuma Baoakai nomination of Mr. Joe K. Williams as Vice Chairman for Administration and Customer Affairs at the Liberia Land Authority (LLA).
In a statement issued recently, members of the civil society working group said they hold nothing against the qualification of the individual concerned, but they want to state for the record that the appointment violates Part III section 16.2 of the Act establishing the Liberia Land Authority.
This section states “Commissioners shall be appointed on a non partisan basis and shall be selected for their integrity, impartiality and their selection shall reflect regional and gender consideration with the provision that no two commissioners shall come from the same county.”
“On the contrary to this section, and the fact that the present Commissioner for Land Policy and Planning of the LLA, Cllr. Kula Jackson, is a native of Bong, the nomination of another citizen of Bong County is perhaps a mistake and for which the President has been ill-advised to nominate another son of Bong County as Vice Chair for the LLA,” the groups said in a statement.
The statement further said “The civil society would like to point out this contradiction in the appointment of the Vice Chair, so that His Excellency the President can take appropriate action, not to be seen as violating the Act of the LLA.”
“We like to state for the record also that the Liberia Land Authority is not a political institution, but a technical institution that is set up to address the gross injustices that Liberians have suffered from over the years expressed in unequal land protection and insecure land tenure for most Liberian residents in rural communities of the country. The LLA is set up to oversee the implementation of a people’s land law that should address the historical injustices of the past,” the working group further said in a statement.
The statement was jointly issued by the Civil Society Working Group on Land Rights Reform and the Multi Actor Platform on Land Governance and Responsible Agricultural Investment in Liberia (MAP Liberia Land Platform)
