Factors influencing land title registration practice in Osun State, Nigeria

• Author: Benjamin Gbolahan Ekemode, Oluseyi Joshua Adegoke, Adetunji Aderibigbe
• Position: Department of Estate Management, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria
• Pages: 240-255

Factors influencing land title

registration practice in

Osun State, Nigeria

Benjamin Gbolahan Ekemode,Oluseyi Joshua Adegoke and

Adetunji Aderibigbe

Department of Estate Management,

Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria

Abstract

Purpose –The registrationof land titles is an important component of title documentationand certification

process that is influenced by a varietyof factors. The purpose of this paper is, therefore, to examine factors

influencingland title registration practice in Osun State, Nigeria.

Design/methodology/approach –Data used for this paper were collected from 520 land title

registration applicants, representing 48.10 per cent of the total number of applicants for land title/property

rights registration in Osun State,Southwestern Nigeria, using systematic random sampling technique,with

sampling intervalk = 5. Data collected were analyzedusing descriptive and inferential statistical techniques,

such as frequencydistribution and percentages, relativeimportance index (RII) and factor analysis.

Findings –The findings revealedthat factors such as high cost of title documentationand corrupt practices

of land registry staff had significantinfluence on land title/property rights registration process,while factors

such as suitability of organizational structure and personnel competence/low morale had less influence on

land title registrationin the study area.

Practical implications –The findings of this paper suggest the inadequacies inherent in the land title

registrationprocess in the study area which has significant implicationsfor land titling registration process in

Osun State,the entire Nigerian state and other emergingAfrican economies.

Originality/value –The paper is one of the few papers that analyzed the factors influencing land title

registrationfrom the perspective of end-users in an emerging Africaneconomy like Nigeria.

Keywords Land, Factors, Property rights, Land administration, Land title registration, Land titles

Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction

Land has been generally identified as a vital resource for humankind. As a factor of

production, which is combined withother resources in the production and manufacturing of

goods and services, land is a key asset for the development of any society. As a key asset,

land is of great economic significance for the growth and advancement of any country;

hence, the extent of the managementof land resources in any country could affect its level of

economic growth and development(Aderibigbe et al., 2015). There is abundance of evidence

in the literature that economic advancement in any country is underpinned by secure

property rights arising from an efficient and transparent land/property rights registration

and certification process (see, for example,Deininger and Binswanger, 1994;De Soto, 2000;

Galal and Razzaz, 2001;Arnot and Meadows, 2006; Department for International

Development (DFID), 2012; Ehwi and Asante, 2016, among others). Given that the need for

an effective, secured and transparent land administration cannot be overemphasized, it is

pertinent to ensurethat land/property rights registration and certificationprocess fit into the

IJLBE

9,3

240

Received10 April 2017

Revised14 July 2017

Accepted20 July 2017

InternationalJournal of Law in the

BuiltEnvironment

Vol.9 No. 3, 2017

pp. 240-255

© Emerald Publishing Limited

1756-1450

DOI 10.1108/IJLBE-04-2017-0014

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:

www.emeraldinsight.com/1756-1450.htm

dynamics of a global economy. The globalization of businesses have fueled cross-border

investments and foreign direct investments by global market players and institutional

investors into other countries, otherthan countries of origin; and as land is a basic resource

for economic development, secured land/property rights, evidenced by an effective and

transparent land title registration system is an essential requirement upon which such

investment decisionsare anchored (Quinn, 1997;Baum and Murray, 2011).

Land title registration process is a mechanism for the documentation, formalization and

certification of land/property titles and ownership rights. It refers to the system of giving

formal or government recognition to proprietary rights the ownership of a parcel of land

confers on the individual holder. Griffith-Charles (2004) noted that land titling is the initial

process of formally recognizing proprietary rights in land, while land registration is the

process of initially recording legally valid rights to land. The study contended that the

registration of land titleensures the additional guarantee not only of those rights being valid

but also of the transactions regarding those rightsbeing legally recognized by virtue of the

recording process. Thus, land title/rights registration system involves theauthentication of

the ownership of, or a legal interest in, a parcel of land. Therefore, land title registration

leads to land title certification.In this study, land title certification emanates from and is the

end-product of land titleregistration.

However, several factorssuch as economic (Binswanger and Deininger, 1993;Baharoglu,

2002), social (Besley and Burgess, 2000;Van der Mollen, 2002), institutional (Binswanger

et al.,1995;Alston et al.,1996;Deininger, 2003), administrativeand bureaucratic bottlenecks

(Ehwi and Asante, 2016;Kuntu-Mensah, 2006), technological (Thontehh and Omirin, 2015;

Nubi and Ajoku, 2009), financial constraints (De Moura et al., 2010) and socio-economic

background of end-users (land title applicants) (de Soto, 2000;Deininger et al.,2009) have

been identified as the potential determinants of land title/property rights registration in

different countries, most especially in emerging Asian and Latin America economies.These

factors often influence the certificationof land/property rights and the security of property/

land tenure with its attendanteffects on economic growth.

In most emerging African economies, including Nigeria,the absence of a functional and

transparent land title certification process is still very apparent, and this, according to

De Soto (2000) and Arnot and Meadows (2006), implied the limitationof the transformation

and conversion of the land –the primary source of wealth owned by the poor into capital,

through land/property collaterization, thereby inhibiting capital flow and economic

development. In Nigeria, Arnot and Meadows (2006) attributed this scenario to the

preponderance of several factors such as bureaucratic bottlenecks and opaque official

procedures, lack of technology and innovation,rampant corruption, non-computerization of

land registry. This is also exacerbated by a lack of cadastral maps, acute shortage of

physical facilities and equipments including the multiplicity and overlap of functions by

government agencies (Bisiriyu, 2008 cited in Ojo, 2014), resulting in poor service delivery

and continual users’dissatisfactionwith land registration systems.

The corollary of the foregoing is that arising from increasing globalization prompting

cross-border foreign direct investment, most especially into emerging markets such as

BRICS and N-11 or Next 11 (Adetula, 2014), there is the need to have insight into the

factors influencing the registration and certification of land title/property rights in

Nigeria. This will provide information that could aid international investors and global

market players in making well-informed investment decision about Nigeria. The purpose

of this paper is, therefore, to examine the factors influencing the registration of land title/

property rights in Osun State Nigeria from the perspective of the end-users. This

approach is justified as majority of the available studies in Nigeria such Nubi and

Land title

registration

practice

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