Borno issued over 1,000 C of Os in last 3 years, surpasses that of last 2 decades –BOGIS 

AHMED MARI, Maiduguri

The Executive Secretary of the Borno State Geographic Information Service (BOGIS), Engr. Adam Bababe, has said within last three years of its inception, the agency has secured the signing of over 1,000 Certificates of Occupancy (C of Os), which has surpassed those signed from 199 to to 2020.

 Engr. Bababe, who disclosed this in an interactive session with Journalists at the agency’s office, Maiduguri, during the weekend, said:  “From 1999 to 2019, only 1,722 C of Os were signed by the various successive Governors, while from 2020 to 2022 over 1,000 C of Os were signed which had supposed the ones signed in the last two decades”.

He said the completion of the digitalization process was a good footing for land administration and management in the state, stressing that what remains was to marry  what is obtained in the  file with what is on ground for geophysics mapping, as there were cases of 500 plots in the files, while on ground you have 600 to 800 plots.

“In addition to this, over 200, 000 files have been captured and moved  from archive to digital information system as part of our ongoing digitalisation process and effective land administration and management”, Engr Bababe said.

He said the ongoing digitalization process has greatly helped in reducing land racketeering and disputes and called on general public to come to the agency and formalize all their land tittles.

He said contrary to rumours going round that the agency has been charging high rate, a plot of land in a high density areas are being charged N450 per annum, medium density areas are charged N900 per annum, while low density areas like GRA are charged only N1,350 per annum, stressing that it is only N1, N2 and N3, per square meter are being charged for high, medium and low density per annum, respectively.

The Executive Secretary said in order to give opportunities for those that have traditional and local land ownerships, the agency has created a window that they would automatically migrate from Bulama papers to a formal land tittles with just a small amount of money and called on those who have traditional land ownership to take advantage of the opportunity.

He also  called on those that built houses in water to vacate before the next  rainy season as  these houses would be demolished, adding that in the past, they earmarked over 1,500 houses which  were built in waterways for demolition but many people kicked against it.

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