Why Survey plan is the most Essential Document for Land Search

A Survey plan is a document that measures the boundary of a parcel of land to give an accurate measurement and description of that land. The people that handle survey issues are Surveyors and they are regulated by the office of the Surveyor general in Lagos as it relates to survey issues in Lagos. A survey plan must contain the following information:

1. The name of the owner of the land surveyed

2. The Address or description of the land surveyed

3. The size of the land surveyed

4. The drawn out portion of the land survey and mapped out on the survey plan document

5. The beacon numbers

6. The surveyor who drew up the survey plan and the date it was drawn up

7. A stamp showing the land is either free from Government acquisition or not.

A Survey Plan to me is the most important document that you must ask the Omonile, agent or family that intends to sell the land/property to you TO PRODUCE. This survey plan is what Omonile Lawyer would carry to the Land Bureau to do a geographical search  or take our designated Registered Surveyor to the land to pick out the coordinates of the land to compare at at the Surveyor general’s office  whether it is a good land or not.

No matter how cheap or beautiful or strategically located a land or property is, once that property has been discovered to be designated for Government use in future, there is no point going any further to purchase it. It will be a very foolish risk to attempt to defile the government and say nothing would happen, at least there are so many houses around or so many people have bought their own and nothing has happened.

Well for those who are conversant with the Lagos State Government’s no nonsense approach in maintaining the master plan of Lagos, once your property is within that area that has being designated for future Government use, no matter how long it may be, the plan must be carried out accordingly and your property will go down without any form of compensation because you failed to do the right thing by throwing caution to the wind. Examples include the 8 Lane Dual Carriage Way in Badagry that all the houses that were on that land were demolished, All the houses in Alimosho local Government that were near pipe lines, The ones in Idiroko, The houses in ijegun etc! In fact remind me of the ones you know.

Also in Lekki Ajah, it’s even worse because there are some areas that have been specially acquired by the government for over 20 years and it’s just now that the government is trying to recover its lands. These areas are what are known as COMMITTED LANDS. Once an area has been designated as Committed, it is the ultimate no go area to purchase a land. That’s where the government has committed those areas for Road expansions, future government estates or Government Reserved areas for major developments.

As long as that Property is designated as Committed or Under Government Acquisition, it is only the Government of the day that can revoke it  and grant you the right to obtain good title for that land bought under Acquisition but if the government hasn’t given you the right to obtain a good title there, then those buying into those areas are buying at their own mega risk. Don’t for once look at the houses around there as your guide to mean the government cannot demolish those houses, you would be shocked that the owners have 4 or 5 houses and can do away with that one and poor people like you and i that have no mouth to fight government will just be rendered homeless because of our stubbornness to buy at all cost there.

Remember you know where the shoe pinches and how much you have in your pocket. This is 2014 going 2015. Plan to save more money than to throw it away foolishly. Wink

The other option from Government is that if they choose not to demolish your house because it is sited on a committed land, they will end up giving you the option to come and pay Ratification. Ratification in this sense means you’re going to pay Government the full price and taxes it has pre-determined to be the cost of that place and its non negotiable. So imagine you bought the land in 2005 for N2Million in a committed area and in 2010, you now have to pay ratification also known as “Rat” at the cost of N5Million to the Government. Does that make any financial sense to you? Imagine all the fears, rumours, prayers that you would be going through so that those caterpillars don’t come your way.  If and when the government decides not to demolish, they now ask you to pay Ratification in equivalent of  triple or quadruple the amount you bought it and remember the Omonile or Agent you bought it from would be nowhere to be found and if Found, would not in this life time refund or assist you in any way.

Finally another advantage of the Survey Search is that if the land has been designated for Agricultural Purpose, you would know in advance. It’s mostly prevalent in Ikorodu, Badagry and Growing Rural Areas that are just cropping up. Buying into a place designated for Agric is a major no-no! Except you Want Your immediate neighbours to be Cows, Fisheries and probably Obasanjo’s Chicken farmers! Unless it has been designated for Residential or Mixed Development Avoid it pleases.

The summary is that the Survey Plan Search saves you alot of head ache at first before you even move ahead. And once you meet an Omonile or Agent who is extremely difficult with you in terms of not providing the survey plan on demand for search please my brothers and sisters, walk away quietly. The signs are already there for you to know you’re about to be scammed. A survey plan is a public document and not a private cheque book, so you shouldn’t be bamboozled by people who tell you that the owner doesn’t want to release it because of security reasons. Trust me there is no reason. As long as he is ready to sell, that is the first thing you get from them to know your status before proceeding.

Finally I am not a Surveyor in anyway and this information should only serve as a guide for intending land purchasers. You will be well advised to consult a Registered Land Surveyor to give you an insight into what they do and how they do it. I am only talking about the roles Survey plan play as it relates to purchasing land in layman’s terms and why it is an extremely important document to have before, during and after you purchase a land in terms of Land Verification purposes.

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WHAT IS THE MEANING OF GAZETTE

A Gazette is the most bastardized word Land Sellers have peddled around to Purchasers and its the most confusing document that non-land experts have heard and know absolutely nothing about. They neither know what it looks like nor its perceived advantages or disadvantages and why it is one of the most important document you must be connected to unless your home could be demolished in future for it not being associated with it. Now before we talk about what a Gazette is, we have to Know what an Excisions and how they are both connected.

BRIEF HISTORY OF A GAZETTE:
Before the Land-Use Act in 1978 was enacted, Traditional families who had so much land power under their control benefited from taking pleasure over all the rights given to them as land owners. Because of this mega-power they wielded with land, they gave out lands to individuals under a tenancy system for them to use the land either for fishing or farming while they still maintained control over the portion of the land given to the individual.

It wasn’t until the creation of Lagos Executive Development Board in the 1950s that individuals where now able to acquire land from the board directly in exchange for a sum of money instead of going to meet the traditional families to obtain land.  This led to the Traditional Families now splitting their lands to keep some for the family use and others for sale to individuals directly to compete with the Lagos Executive Development.

This system still made the Traditional Families total top dogs in exercising exclusive rights with lands they chose to sell and the ones they chose to keep. This eventually led to the birth of land speculation in Nigeria because lands were very expensive to purchase and difficult to obtain. Because of this and other ancillary reasons, it finally led to the promulgation of the Land Use Decree on the 28th of March, 1978 that vested all lands in every state of the Federation under the control of the State Governors. People could now directly obtain land from the Governor and the Governor could allocate land to the individual or Companies inquiring about land and issue certificate of occupancy to these people it has allocated land to.

The land use act coupled with other laws made it possible for the Governor who was now the owner of all lands in the state to actually have the power to Acquire more lands Compulsorily for its own public purpose to provide Amenities for the greater good of the citizens. The Acquisition of land from the Family by the Governor who is now the custodian of all lands in the state was now empowered by the Land Use Act to take the general control and management of all URBAN land and any area designated as an Urban area by the Governor shall be  published in an Official Government Record book known as the Gazette.

Any area, community or village the Governor designates as an Urban Area is an Acquired land and the rest of the land it has not Acquired may be given back to the community it was acquired from in the form of an Excision.

“An Excision means basically taking a part from a whole and that part that has been excised, will be recorded and documented in the official government gazette of that state.”

So for example if in 1981, Victoria Island, Ikoyi and Lekki were all part of one big Community joined together called Oniru and it had no separation to know which area is called ikoyi, lekki or V.I then and it has an approximate total area square meters estimate of 100,000 square meters and the Government is interested in that area and decides to take 70,000 square meters for its self for its own personal use as an Urban Area or public purpose, it will record this acquisition in the official government gazette and also record that the remaining 30,000 square meters has been left alone for the traditional family to have and do with it whatever it pleases it to do.

This  my friends is the sweet relationship between a land under acquisition, an excision and gazette.

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