Business News of Friday, 10 June 2016

Source: GNA

Investors urged to acquire lands legally

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Benson Nutsukpui, the President of the Ghana Bar Association, has urged investors to adhere to the legal forms of acquiring land for their business endeavours.

He said if investors went through the laid down procedures in acquiring lands in Ghana it would help safeguard future litigations which would impede their business activities.

Mr Nutsukpui said this when he interacted with members of the Italian Business Association of Ghana (IBAG) at an open forum in Accra.

The forum forms part of the line ups slated for IBAG's upcoming general meeting which is aimed at briefing members of activities on outstanding events of the association.

Mr Nutsukpui noted that the issue of acquiring Land Title Registration was a major challenge in Ghana due to non-existent proper structured measures to enable the people to easily acquire such titles.

He, therefore, expressed concern over failure of state institutions to put in place measures to address the prevailing difficulty, of which foreigners are mostly affected, in the bid to acquire lands for business purposes.

He said the situation was also compounded by the non- availability of insurance compensation for victims who acquired lands that ended up in litigation and bureaucracy in the process of land registration.

Mr Nutsukpui advised all investors in the country to do proper search on any land at the Lands Registry and Lands Commission to ascertain whether their desired land is registered or not.

“I will encourage all investors to take the pain of embarking on a visit to the site for investigation by questioning the neighbours to authenticate the rightful owner of the land before effecting payments,” he said.

He urged investors never to pay money to one person of the family but ensure that the principal family members and the family head had all given their consent.

Nii Amaa Ollennu, the Vice President of IBAG, said IBAG would continue to support businesses which were helping to create job opportunities for the youth of Ghana.