Design and Implementation of Computerized Land Information System for Ministry of Land and Urban Development Enugu (Case Study of Ministry of Land and Housing Enugu)
Chapter One
OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
The objective of this study is to develop a software that will keep information on:
- Land size, Land location, Land owners, Land use information.
- To facilitate the preparation of certificate of occupancy.
- To assist the prospective buyers to ascertain the ownership and availability of the property.
- To enhance preparation of lease.
- To forestall land speculation, with its attendant violence, destruction of lives and property.
- To promote land information security.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
LAND PROPERTY
Property is any physical or intangible entity that is owned by a person or jointly by a group of persons (Bethell, 1998). Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property has the right to consume, sell, rent, mortgage, transfer, exchange or destroy their property, and/or to exclude others from doing these things. Important widely recognized types of property include real property (land), personal property (physical possessions belonging to a person), private property (property owned by legal persons or business entities), public property (state owned or publicly owned and available possessions) and intellectual property (exclusive rights over artistic creations, inventions, etc.), although the latter is not always as widely recognized or enforced. A title, or a right of ownership, establishes the relation between the property and other persons, assuring the owner the right to dispose of the property as they see fit. Some philosophers assert that property rights arise from social convention. Others find origins for them in morality or natural law.
Various scholarly disciplines (such as law, economics, anthropology or sociology) may treat the concept more systematically, but definitions vary within and between fields. Scholars in the social sciences frequently conceive of property as a bundle of rights. They stress that property is not a relationship between people and things, but a relationship between people with regard to things.
Property is usually thought of as being defined and protected by the local sovereignty. Ownership, however, does not necessarily equate with sovereignty. If ownership gave supreme authority, it would be sovereignty, not ownership. These are two different concepts.
Public property is any property that is controlled by a state or by a whole community (Ankerl, (1978). Private property is any property that is not public property. Private property may be under the control of a single person or by a group of persons jointly.
Modern property rights are based on conceptions of ownership and possession as belonging to legal persons, even if the legal person is not a natural person. In most countries, corporations, for example, have legal rights similar to those of citizens. Therefore, the corporation is a juristic person or artificial legal entity, under a concept that some refer to as “corporate personhood”.
Property rights are protected in the current laws of most states, usually in their constitution or in a bill of rights. Protection is also prescribed in the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 17, and in the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), Protocol 1.
Traditional principles of property rights include:
- Control of the use of the property
- The right to any benefit from the property (examples: mining rights and rent)
- A right to transfer or sell the property
- A right to exclude others from the property.
Traditional property rights do not include:
- Uses that unreasonably interfere with the property rights of another private party (the right of quiet enjoyment)
- Uses that unreasonably interfere with public property rights, including uses that interfere with public health, safety, peace or convenience.
Not every person or entity with an interest in a given piece of property may be able to exercise all possible property rights. For example, as a lessee of a particular piece of property, you may not sell the property, because a tenant is only in possession and does not have title to transfer. Similarly, while you are a lessee, the owner cannot use their right to exclude or to keep you from the property, or, if they do, you may be entitled to stop paying rent or sue for access.
Further, property may be held in a number of forms, such as through joint ownership, community property, sole ownership or lease. These different types of ownership may complicate an owner’s ability to exercise property rights unilaterally. For example, if two people own a single piece of land as joint tenants then, depending on the law in the jurisdiction, each may have limited recourse for the actions of the other. For example, one of the owners might sell their interest in the property to a stranger whom the other owner does not particularly like.
CHAPTER THREE
DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS OF THE EXISTING SYSTEM
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GENERAL ANALYSIS OF THE EXISTING SYSTEM
In Ministry of land and housing Enugu state, land information is documented manually. Files are created for different plots of land. These files are kept in a file cabinet. In the file, all the details of the property owner, land size and location is documented. Any form of transfer or sales is equally recorded on the file manually.
FACTS FINDING METHOD
During the research work, data needed for the project was gathered from various sources. In gathering and collecting necessary data and information needed for system analysis, one major fact-finding technique was used in this work and it is:
CHAPTER FOUR
SYSTEM DESIGN
DESIGN STANDARDS
The new system designed for keeping land information system will among other things:
- Have a workable form through which all the inputs will be made to the system.
- Have a well formatted output on land information
- Enable search on the land database
- Create a modular programming interface for easy debugging.
- Design a system that will be very fast in operation.
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, RECOMMENDATIONS AND CONCLUSION
Summary
The doctrine of land ownership has much importance today; its influence still lingers in some areas. The concepts of landlord and tenant have been recycled to refer to the modern relationship of the parties to land which is held under a lease. It has been pointed out by Professor F.H. Lawson in Introduction to the Laws of Property (1958), however, that the landlord-tenant relationship never really fitted into the feudal system and was rather an “alien commercial element”.
The doctrine of tenure did not apply to personality (personal property). However, the relationship of bailment in the case of chattels closely resembles the landlord-tenant relationship that can be created in land. So, much emphasis has been laid on the need for a proper documentation of land owners information to enable the public and government access land information at any time.
RECOMMENDATION
The research project has elaborated much on the use and need for a computerized land information system. Much work is still needed as the ministry of land and housing Enugu has to make provisions for the implementation of the software developed, organize staff training, and establish maintenance services on the software.
CONCLUSION
Real property and personal property are the main classifications of property in the common law. Real property refers to land and the improvements made by human efforts—buildings, machinery, the acquisition of various property rights, and the like. Real property is also termed realty, real estate, and immovable property.
In countries with personal ownership of real property, civil law protects the status in realty markets, where realtors work in realty selling real estate. Scottish civil law calls it heritable property, and in France it is said to be immobiliser.
To be of any value a claim to any property must be accompanied by a verifiable and legal property description. Such a description could make use of natural boundaries such as river and roads, or make use of purpose made markers such as cairns, posts, survey marks, etc.
So the land information system contains details on the land size, location, ownership and land use.
REFERENCES
- Ankerl, G. 1978, “Beyond Monopoly Capitalism and Monopoly Socialism: Distributive Justice in a Competitive Society.” Cambridge MA
- Baker, S., M., Richardson, D., and Young, S. (1997) The Politics of Sustainable Development: Theory and Practice within the European Union. London, Routledge.
- Baker, J. 1990 An Introduction to English Legal History (3rd edition)
- Bastiat, F. 1850. Economic Harmonies. W. Hayden Boyers, trans. George
- de Huszar, ed. Liberty Fund
- Bethell, T. 1998. The Noblest Triumph: Property and Prosperity through the Ages. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
- Bird, R.M. (1994) Financing Local Services: Pattern, Problems and Possibilities. Paper prepared for Global Report on Human Settlements, University of Toronto.
