Property
Certificate of Occupancy:
Know How To
By Bolaji Yusuf
T
he Land use act in practice
vests, grants and gives all
the land in each state to the
Governor of each state and
the Governor is the only
person that can grant statutory Rights
of Occupancy to anyone who intends
to own land in the state. The proof of
this grant given to the owner of the
land is what is commonly known as
a CERTIFICATE OF OCCUPANCY
which translates to the legal right to
occupy a land also referred to as
(C of O).
The State Governor is the Landlord of
all Lands in that state and every holder
of a C/O is a tenant to the Governor
and is given a 99 year lease on that
land to develop it.
It’s also important to know that there
are 4 major types of C/O
1. A Private C/O
2. A Global C/O
3. A Government Scheme C/O
4. A Federal Government C/O
1. A PRIVATE C/O
A Private C/O is given to an individual
who has declared his interest in land
that is free from acquisition and has
not yet being registered previously.
These kind of C/Os are given to the
private Individual by the State Government and it has its own special features
that makes it unique to that Individual
alone such as the Individual’s picture,
his full name, description of that area
of land, the page number and volume
the C/O was registered and how many
years the C/O Has been granted to
the Individual to use that land. It also
has the information of whether the
holder of the C/O can use the land for
Residential, Commercial or Mixed
purpose and most importantly, it has
the Survey plan of the land allocated to
that specific Individual.
2. A STATE GOVERNMENT
SCHEME C/O
A State Govern