Land Issues in the Rwanda’s Post-Conflict Law Reform.

Rwanda is a small, landlocked country with an area of 26,338 square kilometres, only 52% of which is used or developed. The country has a population of nearly ten million people, with a population growth rate of 3.1% and a high urbanisation rate of 8% a year. The average population density for the country as a whole has been estimated at 330 persons per km in 2002, making it one of the highest density levels in Africa. This stimulates a high demand for housing, especially in urban areas where 25,000 new dwelling units are said to be needed annually. Land is used intensively, and, while a formal market is expanding, most land continues to be held under customary tenure. In Rwanda, the existence of the Napoleonic Civil Code offered formal legal titles, but these were only available in the towns and cities and in effect they were available only to those who made substantial investments in the land. This right was not accessible to the majority of ordinary Rwandans; with only 1% of the land registered, almost all of Rwanda’s land is still held under customary or local tenure. Successive waves of violence between 1959 and 1994 have weakened these informal structures. Population pressure, land scarcity and economic development are now increasing the demand for and hence the value of land. An active informal market in land has arisen to meet that demand. Customary tenure, such as it is, is no longer enough. As a result, all citizens are increasingly demanding access to formal systems to register their rights in land.1 In 2003, Government started a long process of consultation on land tenure. That revealed broad support for land tenure reform and led to the drafting of the National Land Policy (2004) and the enactment of the Organic Land Law (OLL) in 2005. In 2006, the Ministry of Land, Environment, Forestry, Water and Natural Resources (MINITERRE) carried out detailed field consultations in rural, urban and suburban settings. This was followed in 2007 by field trials that tested formal tenure regularisation procedures and processes that would lead to simple registration of land. These procedures were implemented by locally appointed committees and technicians to see how the population would respond to formal systems and what the practical difficulties would be in its implementation. The trials also served to ensure all of the issues were properly tested to inform the legal and institutional development process.2 After the successful trial of land registration, the Government of Rwanda introduced a roll out of land tenure regularisation countrywide and this programme is supposed to be completed within three years (2013). The sections below analyse this programme and how land related legislation is implemented. It also discusses the likely consequences and policy implications of the programme.