JEDDAH, 19 December 2005 — The Jeddah Municipality held its third lottery to distribute plots of land to Saudi citizens yesterday at the King Abdul Aziz University (KAAU) celebration hall.
Distributed lands were located far north of the outskirts of Jeddah. A municipality official in the ceremony said that the area has no facilities.
The drawing, held for university staffers, was done in order to specify which plots of land went to whom.
A questionnaire was given to all the new landowners, which asked if they would help provide financial backing for the development of the land.
Mohammed Sadiq Al-Jifri, general supervisor of the directorate of lands and possessions, said it would take a long time before services appear in the area. “Usually it take 10 to 12 years for public facilities to appear in lands given away by the municipality due to their remote locations,” he said.
He said that they have only 435 plots of land to give away to university academics. More than 700 applied.
“We give away lands on a first-come-first-serve basis,” he said.
He mentioned that the municipality would continue giving away plots for citizens as soon as new ones are located and organized.
Milfi Al-Saadi, a KAAU academic, said that he applied for the land 10 years ago. “I don’t know about the land and its worth,” he said adding that he doubts what he would contribute financially in developing the free land. “I must go and see the area first to determine if it is worth developing or not. If the area is not so encouraging, I might as well sell it.”
The municipality has recently implemented the lottery system for assigning ownership, which, according to municipal officials, has been a success in terms of transparency and fairness.
He said they have also established a website to help applicants monitor their land locations and serves those who want to apply for municipality lands.
