Assessing the procedure for acquisition of building permit for infrastructure development in Ghana: A case study of the Ashanti Region.
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Date
November 2019
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Abstract
The Local Governance Act, 2016, Act 936 section 91(I) mandates every citizen of Ghana who intends to build to obtain building permit from the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies. Besides, the National Building Regulations, 1996, L.I.1630 regulation 2 also makes it clear how building permit could be obtained from a district planning authority. Thus, these laws make it compulsory for every private developer to seek for building permit before he/she starts to build. However, there is a paucity of studies on the procedure and challenged faced for acquisition of building permit for infrastructure development in Ghana especially in the Metropolitan, Municipal and Districts Assemblies (MMDAs) in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. The aim of the study was to assess the process of building permit acquisition towards recommendation for improvement in the application process. This study employed a cross sectional design with quantitative strands of research. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 131 staffs from eleven (11) MMDAs in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. Structured questionnaires in a close ended format was used as the main research instrument. Data were analyzed using mean, percentages and frequencies as analytical frameworks. The study found that the current process of building permit acquisition include land acquisition, land registration, and confirmation of title, preparation of building design, purchase, submission of application forms among others. Delay, high cost of fees, bureaucratic were the main challenges associated with the acquisition of building permits for infrastructural development. The study also found that educating the public about the important associated with the permit system, reduction of the bureaucratic nature of the process, reduction in the duration for acquiring building permits among others as the measures that can be put in place to solve the current challenges associated with the building permit acquisition. In order to promote the effectiveness of the building permit system and to ensure sustainable development of the cities especially, the current system should be redesigned by integrating all the agencies involved in the building permit acquisition process to a central database management system.
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A thesis submitted to the Department of Construction Technology and Management, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the Degree of Masters of Science in Construction Management,
Keywords
Building Permit Acquisition, Infrastructure Development, MMDAs, Ashanti Region, Ghana