According to the proposed amendment, not following the legal procedure by giving first option to tenants would however mean that the transaction is invalid and that the Commissioner would not make any entry on a certificate in respect to such a transaction. In theory, declaring a transaction invalid is a good incentive to make people follow a procedure. However, given that the procedure is so cumbersome and that the competent institutions are lacking resources, the only effect the proposed amendment can have is to discourage owners from selling their land altogether and to encourage recourse to informal arrangements. Here again the proposed amendment does not address the actual cause of owners circumventing the law. Declaring selling arrangement illegal for not giving first option to tenants can only have a beneficial impact if it is supplemented by other policies, such as providing funds to enable tenants to buy the land. The original good idea behind stipulating an obligation to give first option to the tenant was to allow tenants to buy themselves out and thus gradually abolish conflicting rights. This can however not be realised as long as tenants lack the resources to buy the land. Thus, in order to benefit them, tenants would need assistance to buy the land, possibly through the Land Fund. As long as this assistance is not provided, the obligation of giving first option and the proposed amendment which only reinforces the current position by criminalising owners can hardly yield any benefit. h) Does the Land Bill infringe upon the constitutional right to property? Some have raised constitutional concerns about the Bill. As mentioned above it has been claimed that by requiring a court order for evictions, by limiting the reason for evictions to the non-payment of rent, and by criminalising unlawful evictions, the amendment violates the Constitution, namely Article 26(1). Whereas the amendment conflicts with the Constitution in some respects as will be shown later, the claim that it violates Article 26 is not convincing. Article 26(1) of the Constitution states that“every person has a right to own property either individually or in association with others”. However, this does not mean that it is the registered owner of a piece of land who must have the full authority over his land. Rather, Article 237(8) and(9) of the Constitution provide that lawful or bona fide occupants of mailo, freehold or leasehold land shall enjoy security of occupancy and mandate Parliament to pass a law to regulate the relationship between the lawful or bona fide occupants and to provide for the acquisition of registrable interests in the land by the occupant. This suggests that there are limitations to owners’ rights. Since the laws shall provide security of occupancy these limitation may also consist in requiring land owners to get court orders for evictions and limiting grounds for eviction. For the same reason, Article 26(2) cannot be employed to establish the unconstitutionality of 20