The National Land Authority (NLA) has announced plans to recruit additional staff starting in July 2026 to reduce delays in land-related service delivery.
The announcement was made by NLA Director General Marie Grace Nishimwe during an interview with RBA.
She said the increase in demand for land registration services is driven by growing public awareness of the importance of land registration, which has significantly raised the number of applications handled by the institution.
“Public understanding of land registration has grown significantly. In previous years, the files we handled reached about 380,000. But in 2023, we processed over one million cases. This shows that citizens now clearly understand land registration and related transactions,” she said.
She added that the sharp rise in workload requires a corresponding increase in staffing and operational capacity to ensure timely service delivery.
“If in 2023 we were handling around 300,000 files, and now we are processing over one million, then we must also increase capacity to ensure these cases are handled efficiently and on time,” she added.
Nishimwe said the institution has introduced several measures to address the challenge, including the use of modern technology to speed up processing and improve efficiency.
She also noted that NLA is recruiting additional staff, including recent secondary school graduates who will undergo training to support service delivery and accelerate file processing.
She further explained that delays were recorded both at the review and approval stages, prompting the deployment of additional personnel to speed up approvals and improve turnaround times.
A recent audit report by the Office of the Auditor General indicated that as of February 2026, 38,943 land-related files had not yet been reviewed, some of which had remained pending for between six months and two years.
The report also showed that more than 202,000 files were delayed at the approval stage, prompting recommendations for NLA to improve efficiency and speed up service delivery.
