A total of 1.8 million urban lots and 1.6 million rural agrarian plots in the Dominican Republic lack ownership titles, and to address this situation, President Danilo Medina ordered a mass registration of state property yesterday, Tuesday 13 November, especially areas where there have been agrarian reform projects and housing projects. The President’s decision is outlined in decree 624-12, which creates the Permanent Commission for Issuing Titles for State Lands.
During a press conference in the Orlando Martinez Hall of the Presidential Palace, Minister of Agriculture Luis Ramon Rodriguez said that the Dominican Agrarian Institute (IAD) has 115,000 people registered as settled on state land and only 15,000 of them have property titles. Rodriguez said that the government hopes to give some 150,000 land and property titles to an equal number of people and the first will be given out within three months. In one of its articles, the ordinance says that the commission will coordinate efforts to strengthen the operational and management capacity of the Property Jurisdiction agencies with the Judicial Branch, as well as the prompt action by the Department of Cadastre.
The commission is composed of Presidency minister Gustavo Montalvo and Agriculture minister Rodriguez, as well as the directors general of the Dominican Agrarian Institute (IAD), the National Cadastre, National Assets (BN), and the National Housing Institute (INVI), as well as by the Administrator General of the Agriculture Bank (Bagricola), the Executive Director of the National Sugar Council (CEA) and the Dominican Agro-Business Board (JAD). In order to obtain a title to the property, the person should have lived and worked on the property for at least five years. Likewise, the Title Commission can present proposals to modify the regulations with the aim of making it possible and of facilitating the entitlement procedures and sponsor public hearings in order to guarantee the participation of the sectors concerned.