CHALLENGES TO THE APPLICATION OF THE PRINCIPLE OF ‘EMINENT DOMAIN’ IN LAND ADMINISTRATION IN NIGERIA

Abstract

In many societies including Nigeria, land is privately held. The State sometimes require these privately held land for public purposes. Negotiated acquisition of private land for public use can be a protracted and frustrating affair. This inconvenience led to the innovation of compulsory acquisition of private land by the State for public purposes subject to payment of just compensation. The power of the state to compulsorily acquire private property for public use is called ‘eminent domain.’ It traces its origin to days of ancient Rome. The concept of eminent domain in its modern form owes its scholastic foundations to the works of the 17^th century Dutch philosopher, Hugo Grotius who described it as an attribute of statehood or sovereignty and advocated for payment of a just compensation for every act of expropriation. In Nigeria, the principle of eminent domain is codified in the Land Use Act which not only vests radical title to all land comprised within the territory of a State in the Governor, to hold in trust for the benefit of all Nigerians, but also grants the Governor the power of compulsory acquisition of privately held land subject to the payment of adequate compensation. The paper analyzed the exercise of the right of eminent domain by State Governors in Nigeria and concluded that in several instances the procedure laid down for the exercise is often ignored by the Governors. Using the doctrinal research methodology, the paper finds that the lack of punitive sanctions for irregular or outright illegal expropriation is one of the energy sources fueling the culture of arbitrary and whimsical expropriation of private property in Nigeria. The author maintained that for a better and more efficient public land acquisition system, the creation of a land ombudsman imbued with jurisdiction to handle expropriation disputes which are rendered non-justiciable by the Land Use Act and the imposition of penalties for land-acquiring authorities will operate to check the abuse of the power of eminent domain.