No more paper records as Ardhi House goes digital

Lands CS Faridah Karoney [Elvis Ogina, Standard]

Any person wishing to perform any land transactions at the Nairobi Land Registry will from tomorrow be required to access the services online as the Ministry of Lands goes fully digital in Nairobi.

The last documents that the registry will process manually will be those received before the close of business today before President Uhuru Kenyatta launches the system tomorrow.

This comes as the ministry plans to close its Nairobi Registry for a day to allow it to shift operations online through the Lands Information Management System (LIMS). The system was rolled out in 2018.

In an advert in the daily newspapers, Lands Cabinet Secretary Farida Karoney stated that the closure comes after the successful completion of LIMS and it was to give way for migration to the digital platform.

“The system is now complete for the management of land records and transactional services as an anchor for efficient, secure and transparent operations in the lands sector,” she said.

Once the system goes live, Ardhi House will no longer accept manual land documents at the Nairobi Registry as they will do away with manual land transactions. The city registry will also close all its manual registers.

Services that move online include transfer of ownership, issuance of consent, valuation requests, payment and issuance of land rent clearance certificate.

Others are payments of stamp duty, registration fees, consent fees, application and withdrawal of caution/caveats/restrictions, registration of land documents and searches.

A source at the ministry told The Standard today was the last day for processing of documents manually.

The development of LIMS has been a priority for the government in the belief that a digital land management system will seal loopholes in land registration and transfer process that have allowed duplication of land titles.

Land-related services will, however, continue to be available through the e-citizen portal during the one-day closure.

According to the ministry, the new system will enhance investor confidence through reduced timelines in registering property and protecting investors and property owners from fraudulent land transactions.

The digital initiative is meant to improve service delivery by dealing with missing documents, failed file tracking system, tattered records in the land registries, and long timelines of service delivery, among other challenges.

The system will also be linked to external service providers including Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA), the National Lands Commission, banks, and other key institutions involved in land matters.

Further, the use of LIMs will minimise land fraud by making it easy to detect changes or alterations.