CURBING THE MENACE OF LAND GRABBING IN OGUN STATE: AN APPRAISAL OF THE CURRENT LEGISLATIONS

ABSTRACT Land grabbing has been a prevalent legal issue in Nigeria over the years. This is most common in South Western Nigeria, as we have a group of land grabbers that are popularly referred to as “omoonile” or “ajagungbale” that is, children of land holders or forceful acquirers of land. They have been a cause of distress to land owners and developers. Their operation makes smooth property development impossible. They extort land owners and sometimes, where their requests are not met, cause death to land owners. This has caused a major setback in the real estate industry. To curb this menace, Ogun state, one of the South Western states has enacted a law that seeks to make land grabbing a thing of the past. This is The Ogun State ‘Prohibition of Forcible Occupation of Landed Properties Law’ 2016, popularly known as the ‘Anti-Land Grabbing Law.’ This law was enacted to checkmate the activities of the Land grabbers in various parts of Ogun State. This law provides for sanctions that will be applicable where anyone is found trying to encroach on another’s land or extort a land owner trying to develop his property. However, this law seems to be inefficient as there has been an increase in the rate at which these land grabbers operate, as opposed to the decrease expected as a result of the law. This brings a question as to why this is so. It also makes one think of possible solutions to ensuring the enforcement of this law and to see to the eradication of land grabbing in Ogun state. This study explores the ripple effect of the Omo-Onile phenomenon on the Ogun state land market highlighting the challenges faced by developers, and landowners. It also seeks to examine the laws that seek to eradicate land grabbing in Ogun state, how they are being enforced, the efficiency so far, the causes of the inefficiency and proffer possible solutions to the menace.