A Place of the Village Rural Land Management Committee in Land Governance in Tioro: North Ivory Coast

Abstract

This study is guided by the question how does the Village Committee for Rural Land Management intervene in a land context that reserves the exclusivity of land governance to customary authorities? The objective is to analyze the political implications of the institution of the land committee in land governance in Tioro, a locality of the north of the Ivory Coast. Opting for a qualitative research approach, we have built a framework of investigation structured around the land system, customary land governance, the implementation of land law 98-750 and the forms of relations between actors and authorities. This investigation framework was submitted to the traditional and administrative authorities, to the agents of the Rural Land Service of the Regional Directorate of Agriculture, to the members of the land committee and to the land users. It emerges from this study that the Tioro land system is structured around the collective use of the land and the organization of its governance around the village chief, and land chief. Despite the establishment of a Village Land Management Committee, a new frame resulting from the application of law 98 750 of December 23 relating to rural land, customary authorities remain the central figures of local land governance. Reclaimed by customary land authorities, the land committee functions as a technical instrument controlled by the chief. The mode of rural land governance inaugurated by the involvement of the Land Committee at the village level further strengthens the power of customary authorities.