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Ministry launches electronic certificates for simpler, more secure land registry
The electronic land certificate would help authorities to simplify the land registry process and curb land cartels, the ministry claimed.
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A State Land Agency (BPN) official assists a resident with his land certificate at the Dumai Land Agency office in Riau on Feb. 11, 2021. The Agrarian and Spatial Planning Ministry is planning to use electronic land certificates for simpler and more secure land registration. (Antara/Aswaddy Hamid)
T
he Agrarian and Spatial Planning Ministry is introducing an electronic land certificate as part of an effort to simplify the land registry process and curb land cartels. However, the plan has drawn concern from critics about lingering tenurial conflicts and data security.
Minister Sofyan Djalil has recently issued a ministerial regulation stipulating that the ministry would issue electronic certificates for plots of land that were already registered as well as newly registered land. The electronic certificate would have the same legal standing as the printed one, as the former would be issued to replace the latter.
The ministry’s director for land registry management Dwi Purnama suggested in a statement that the electronic land certification would increase efficiency in the land registration process, while also decreasing the potential of land conflicts.
Separately, Sofyan claimed that that the electronic certificates would also help authorities to curb land cartels that often drove investors away from the country and harmed landowners.
Read also: Provincial zoning plans trigger, exacerbate land conflicts
Recently, former deputy foreign minister Dino Patti Djalal tweeted that her mother had become a victim of a land cartel, as the name on the certificate for a house she owned was changed without her authorization.
Dino alleged that the perpetrator forged an identity card and cooperated with a broker to change the house's ownership at the State Land Agency (BPN). He urged law enforcers to arrest the perpetrators and the land agency to prevent such incidents from happening in the future.
