The number of landowners ‘downloading electronic land titles’ instead of using ‘paper land titles is growing, making it easier to deny fraudsters a chance especially because it was easy to forge non-digitalized documents, according to the government agency responsible for managing and regulating land use and mapping across the country.

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A new system to help landowners access land titles online was launched in 2023 to reduce cost and time. More than 10 million land titles in papers were supported to be accessed in digital format.

Before the digital system was launched – when paper-based land titles were used – fraudsters were forging the paper-based land titles and signatures, Marie Grace Nishimwe, the Director General of the National Land Authority (NLA), told The New Times, pointing to areas such as Biryogo, a City of Kigali suburb, as one of the areas where such malpractices were committed.

Fraud cases involved dishonest people who would sell land that is not theirs.

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According to Rwanda Investigation Bureau (RIB), three districts of Kigali come on top among five districts with many fraud cases over the past three years.

"One of the strategies that we used was introducing the e-title which indicates that people should consult the land registry to make sure that the e-title is real. They have to provide information to land notaries where they can see the picture of the owner of the plot during the transfer process,” Nishimwe said.

She said that, so far, "866,130 electronic land titles have been downloaded” by land owners.

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Even though the number of landowners who downloaded electronic land titles is still small compared to the number of available land titles, she noted that all land owners can access their e-titles.

"However, many of them do not need it currently because they are not transacting or they still have their physical land titles.”

"People can now verify with the land registry to make sure that the e-title is genuine by dialling *651#. The electronic land title is valid if only the information recorded on it reflects the information in the national land registry. This information is on the e-title and people can access the information that is in the land registry easily.”

According to the agency, the advantages of electronic land titles also includes easy access to other services such as construction permits, justice, tax clearance, and fertilisers and agriculture services, as well as other transactions requiring land titles as a key document.

Previously, the issuance of land titles was done on printed certificates, which came at a cost due to printing expenses, and paperwork. For each new title, someone had to pay Rwf5,000. With the e-title, there is no fee charged.