The Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development has launched the digital Public Portal as part of easing doing business in Uganda and taking land services closer to Ugandans.
Speaking during the launch at the Media Centre on Wednesday, the minister of Lands Judith Nabakooba noted that the new initiative will transform service delivery in the Land sector in the country.
“In the beginning of the new year, I pledged to launch the Lands Public Portal developed by the Ministry in partnership, as part of Government initiatives to implement Article 41 of the Constitution which provides for access to information to citizens. The NRM Government also pledged to bring in on that would enhance service delivery by making it easy for Ugandans to access land information in an instant way using information technology and today, our promise has come to pass,” she said.
Nabakooba added that the purpose of the Public Portal is to provide citizens with instant search results for land titles and instant results on the status of land transactions and verification of parcel detail, upon payment of a search fee of Shs10,000 per search.
“Access to using the Land Information Portals shall begin with KCCA MZO, which covers Mailo, Freehold and Leasehold land titles in Kibuga and Part of Kyadondo. I believe that the commissioning of this Public Portal will achieve transparency and good land governance and respond to citizens’ information requests instantly. As mentioned the Public Portal will provide access to land information under KCCA MZO,” she said.
The Minister however noted the other 22 Ministry Zonal Offices (MZOs) shall be added in a phased manner since they still have other backlogs which they must deal with before they are rolled within the system and all MZOs shall be connected by the end of June 2022. Citizens in the country and those in the diaspora can access this Public Portal via WWW.ugnlis.mlhud.go.ug.
The users shall be required to register in a very simple and automatic way. The searches performed for registered users shall allow for fast access to accurate information on the ownership, encumbrances and location of land.
“Other benefits from using this Portal will include a reduction on interfacing with staff some of whom have been purportedly accused of corrupt tendencies and delays in providing Land related information for decision making. The Ministry’s Call Centre, which was put in place in August 2021 shall respond to anyone that may face challenges and requires further support or clarification. The Toll-Free number is 0800100004 for any query or inquiry. The link to start the public portal registration will be availed on our website.”
The digital portal platform named National Land Information System (NLIS) will allow users to access information on titles and parcels included in the NLIS database. It will also allow tracking the progress of land transactions submitted to the Land Registry.
How to Use NLIS:
To conduct a Title search, you must enter the details of the title the volume and folio number or county, block and plot number as the system will indicate depending on the land.
To conduct a Parcel search, the user must enter the details of the plot which include the county or municipality or the town council; block or road and plot number where the parcel is located. And to search the status of the transaction, the user enters the transaction number included in the receipt provided after submission of documents to the MZO.
The searches in the Public Portal require the payment of Shs10,000 for each search. Registered users can credit their account with search fees paid to Uthe Uganda Revenue Authority (URA) A scanned copy of the receipt and payment Receipt Number (PRN) will be used to upload the payments. A verification of these payments will be done.
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