An investigation into forest ownership and customary land ... - Fern

Table 2 – Area, administrative units and population by county 89
Box 8 – Local government in 2007 90
4 Forests 91
Box 9 – Timeline of forest reform in Liberia 92
Table 3 – Surface area classification in Liberia 94
Table 4 – The target forest estate 95
Table 5 – National Forests in Liberia 96
Table 6 – Existing and proposed protected forests in Liberia 97
Table 7 – Proposed community forests in Liberia 97
Chapter 2 Law and the customary right to land 99
1 Customary law (‘community law’) 101
2 Customary land tenure 102
3 The evolution of statutory land law (‘national law’) 105
Box 10 – The evolving national land law of Liberia 106
3.1 Bringing customary law into national law 107
3.2 The ‘immigrant era’: 1821-1895 107
Box 11 – The first land laws of Liberia 1823-1827 108
3.3 The turn of the century ‘The ‘civilised natives’ era – recognising some natives
as due property rights 110
Box 12 – Register entries of Aborigines Land Deeds for Grand Cape Mount 111
3.4 The ‘Hinterland era’: 1923-1956 112
Box 13 – Tenure provisions of the ‘Hinterland Law’ 1949 114
Box 14 – Example of Collective Aborigines Deed (1938) 115
Table 8 – Aborigines Land Deeds as submitted to fda in 2007 117
Box 15 – Tribal land in the Aborigines Law 118
3.5 Aborigines Deeds as recognition of indigenous ownership 119
3.6 The ‘appropriation’ era: 1956 until the present 119
Box 16 – The critical tenure change from Hinterland to Aborigines Law 120
3.7 Diminishing native land rights 120
3.8 Shifting ground as to understanding and intentions on native rights 121
3.9 A casualty of unification 122
3.10 Consolidating the effects 123
3.11 Signing the death-knell of customary ownership 124
3.12 Creating mass land insecurity 125
Box 17 – Example of Public Sale Deed to a community 126
Table 9 – Collective public land sale deeds as submitted to FDA in 2007 128
4 The Land Law in force today 129
4.1 The curious case of the missing law 129
Box 18 – National law in force pertinent to customary lands 130
4.2 The Public Lands Law and Property Law 134
Box 19 – Sections of Public Lands Law pertinent to customary lands 135
Box 20 – Sections of Property Law pertinent to customary lands 136