Educate land tribunals on how to end rows, DCs told

Mbeya. The regional administration here has issued a three-week- ultimatum to district commissioners and council directors to ensure education is provided to leaders and members of land councils in order to end land disputes and complaints from residents.

The order was given on Tuesday by the Mbeya Regional Commissioner, Mr Amos Makalla, in a meeting to discuss challenges of land disputes.

The meeting, which took place in the region, involved district commissioners, directors, land council leaders, lawyers and council departmental heads. Mr Makalla explained that there were members of the land councils who did not know the limit of their duties, a situation that caused a pileup of cases of the residents, who blamed the government.

“DCs and directors, I don’t want to hear again the residents presenting their land disputes in my meetings. You are now supposed to allocate funds and provide education to village and ward land councils,” the RC said.

The Chairperson of the Land and Housing Council, Arno Mapunga, said the challenge they were facing to solve land dispute cases was lack of knowledge to some members of the land councils.

“Education, a shortage of staff, funds and unfriendly infrastructure in rural areas, are all a problem,” Mapunga said.

A member of the Land Council of Utengule Usongwe Ward, Ms Luth Musa, asked for the provision of education to village and ward land councils.

She said most of the members of the land councils did not know about their obligations in solving land disputes and as a result those land disputes remained unsolved for too long.