Use of Community Relations in Compensation Payment Process in Estate Management Practice: A Case Study of Kwale Industrial Park Acquisition

Abstract

The engagement of a community in any project to be sited in it has always been recommended as the ideal step to take by government and organisations. However, bickering still ensues due to the non-diligent application of community relations, an arm of public relations, that guarantees a cordial relationship between an organisatio n/government and its host communities. Therefore, the principal intention of this conceptual study is on the relationship between Estate Management Practice and Community Relations. This study was conducted to examine what community relations activities are, and to investigate if community relations was applied in the compensation payment process in the case of Kwale Industrial Park Acquisition in Delta State, Nigeria. Persuasion theory served as the theoretical framework of the study. The researchers adopted the library research design and participant observation methods. Results indicate that community relations were partially applied in the compensation payment process. It was concluded that the Land Use Act, which prescribed the method of valuation to be used in acquisition and compensation, did not foresee the problem of gross inadequacies of compensation, and the pre-payment and post-payment disputes associated with it. The researchers, therefore, recommended, amongst others, that there should be public enlightenment from time to time to make the public understand the roles of estate surveyors and valuers, for this will, to a great extent, make the public cease patronising quacks in compensation exercises. Also, Government ministries, specifically the Ministry of Information, Ministry of Land, Surveys and Urban Development, Ministry of Housing, and other Ministries that have anything to do with communities, should have community relations department as an arm to handle community relations issues.