The Commissioner of Lands is responding to an article written by Alfred Sasako and published in the Solomon Star newspaper on Thursday 10th April 2025. The article alleges that the Commissioner is defying a High Court order, which relates to the forfeiture and compulsory acquisition of Fixed Term Estates held by Levers Solomons Ltd (LSL).
The headline in the Solomon Star is factually incorrect. To explain the truth, it is important to summarise the background first. In 2020, the Cabinet of Solomon Islands agreed that all of LSL’s Fixed Term Estates in Guadalcanal should be taken back by a combination of forfeiture and compulsory acquisition. The Commissioner and the then Minister for Lands duly carried out those necessary actions. Those actions were advertised publicly. It is in fact a legal requirement to make a public notice of compulsory acquisition, and in the public interest the Commissioner also notified the public about the forfeitures. LSL has filed claims in the High Court against all of those actions, and those claims are still before the High Court.
In the meantime though, the office of the Commissioner of Lands became aware that some of the land subject of forfeiture and compulsory acquisition was being sold by LSL’s representatives. It is clearly wrong for such land to be sold when the government has stated its intention to take the land back. There is a high risk that unsuspecting buyers could be handing over money for land titles that LSL could lose through these court cases. The Commissioner sought to remind the public that this land is still subject to forfeiture and compulsory acquisition and litigation by publishing the list of parcels in the Island Sun newspaper on Friday 28th March and 3rd April 2025.
It has already been widely reported in the media that the Solomon Islands Government is considering other methods to take back LSL’s Fixed Term Estates. One of those methods is a negotiated and agreed transfer or surrender of those Fixed Term Estates. If the government follows this process, it needs to know whether and to what extent any of these Fixed Term Estates is affected by agreements or offers to sell to other parties, hence the public notice called for information on any such deals. It would not be in the best interests of the government to buy land that LSL has already offered to someone else, or where someone else has already paid LSL or made a deposit.
The Commissioner of Lands sees no harm in publicising this notice, and regards it as acting in the best interests of both the government and the general public. There is nothing untrue or incorrect about the notice. Nevertheless, LSL objected and asked the Commissioner to retract the notice, and the Commissioner refused. On 7th April 2025 LSL filed an application in the High Court for urgent interim orders against the Commissioner’s notice, and the very next day the ex tempore / ex parte orders were given. At the time of this media statement being prepared, the Commissioner of Lands was still yet to be served with the application or the orders, and he was not given any chance to defend himself in court against the application.
In a recent ruling in relation to Pari Development Company’s Fixed Term Estates in Noro, the High Court referred to the Commissioner’s claim that the company was selling land that was under forfeiture. The ruling states that “if the Commissioner is satisfied that the Claimant (the Fixed Term Estate holder) initiated sales of land that it knew were to be forfeited, that would amount to a serious fraud such that the Commissioner would be expected to place the matter before the Commissioner of Police for investigation”. Likewise, an LSL Director has admitted in his sworn statement to the High Court that he was negotiating the sale of land that it knew is under forfeiture and compulsory acquisition. The High Court has labelled this type of action as a serious fraud. The Commissioner of Lands is currently considering filing a criminal complaint against this LSL Director, Hon. Oliver Salopuka.
Finally, the Commissioner of Lands reminds all media personnel to check the facts before publishing untrue articles such as the Solomon Star front page headline “Commissioner of Lands defies High Court Order”. The papers LSL supplied to Alfred Sasako show that the Commissioner refused LSL’s request to withdraw the notice, and Sasako mistakenly thinks that’s the same thing as “defying” the High Court. Plainly they are not the same thing. The application and orders are yet to be served on the Commissioner, and once they are, he will exercise his legal right to apply to the court to set these orders aside.
