Certificates of Occupancy: A Bridge on Mailo Land in Uganda
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.48346/IMIST.PRSM/ajlp-gs.v7i5.50776Keywords:
Certificates of Occupancy, Mailo Land, UgandaAbstract
Context and background
Uganda has four land tenure systems namely Freehold, Mailo, Customary and Leasehold. Unlike the other tenure systems, Mailo land has had problems of tenants-landlord relationship since the signing of the 1900 Buganda agreement which brought about the Mailo land. The agreement created a tenancy for tenants as occupiers and full ownership for landlords thus dual ownership or overlapping rights on such land. At the signing of the agreement, chunks of land that were previously Customary were given out to the King and chiefs as Freehold. However, instead of creating privately owned Freehold, what was created had both occupancy rights and ownership rights which is Mailo land today. From then, there has been an impasse between landlords and tenants and as such, Certificates of Occupancy were created by the Land Act of 1998 as a measure to deal with the impasse between landlords and tenants.
Goal and Objectives:
The main goal of this study was to provide a comprehensive literature review for an ongoing study intended to evaluate the effectiveness of Certificates of Occupancy in securing the tenure of tenants on Mailo land in Uganda.
Methodology:
The method used to collect and analyze data was a comprehensive review of literature using the State-of-the-Art (SotA) literature review approach. Interviews were also used to complement on the literature.
Results:
The impasse between the landlords and tenants creates a lot of issues on the land such as conflicts, under development of the land and in some cases evictions or threats to evictions. There is no security of tenure for either party as each of them is living under threat. The introduction and issuance of Certificates of Occupancies has created an environment of security of tenure where both parties on the land have managed to recognize each other and this has caused positive impact on the land such as reduction on conflicts and promotion of land and infrastructure development although there are still challenges and limitations.
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