The National Council for Peace and Order will be asked to initiate a process to reclaim more than 2,700 rai of forest land in Loei after land documents were found to have been issued illegally, a senior graft-busting official says.
Speaking after inspecting the controversial plots in Phu Rua district, Korntip Daroj, secretary-general of the Public Sector Anti-Corruption Commission (PACC), said the agency will forward the proposal to the regime to reclaim the land worth about 416.5 million baht.
The NCPO is expected to instruct the Land Department to revoke the Nor Sor 3 Kor land rights papers issued for 63 plots covering around 2,777 rai in tambon Pla Ba and tambon Rong Jik and return them to their status of state property, Lt Col Korntip said.
The PACC has looked into the land grab allegation and found that Nor Sor 3 Kor land entitlements, which grant owners of the document the right to access land for farming, were wrongfully issued in a land scam dating back to 1990.
According to the PACC's findings, Sor Khor 1 land certificates from Dan Sai district were used as the basis for the issuance of Nor Sor 3 Kor documents of land in Phu Rua district.
Moreover, owners of 32 of the 63 land plots did not have any official documents to verify their occupation of the land, yet they were issued with Nor Sor 3 Kor land papers, based on the PACC's probe.
Sor Khor 1 papers are documents recognising the rights of occupancy while Nor Sor 3 Kor documents guarantee ownership to holders. The Nor Sor 3 is the final step before the papers are upgraded to title deeds.
According to PACC, some previous owners said they sold their plots to a former teacher in 1989, a year before the documents were upgraded, and they were not unaware of the upgrading process.
Lt Col Korntip said the current owners of these plots gave full cooperation to the officials and denied any knowledge about the upgrade of the land papers.
They also gave written statements agreeing they would return the land to the state.
However, he said the state officials involved in the wrongful issuance of land documents will be spared prosecution because the offences were committed almost 30 years ago and the statute of limitations has already expired.
The PACC's investigation into these 63 plots was launched last year when its officials began looking into an allegation of encroachment and a massive land grab in the Nong Pad mountain forest area, known as Phu Poy, in tambon Pla Ba of Phu Rua district.
