Cancellation of cadastral registration against owners who had a legal title after 60 years, disrupted the legal certainty and violated the right to property
JUDGMENT
Muharrem Güneş and others v. Turkey 24.11.2020 (app. no. 23060/08)
Challenge of ownership of real estate by the state after 55 years and cancellation of title deed after 60 years. Good governance, legal certainty and property rights.
The applicants are owners of a property, the title of which had been registered by their predecessor father, in the Land Registry. Their predecessor had been recognized as the owner of the property since 1951, by virtue of a court decision due to uninterrupted peaceful possession. After 55 years, the ownership of the applicants in some parts of the said property was disputed by the State and after the opinion of the cadastral committee, a registration correction was made and the ownership passed to the state. The domestic courts rejected the applicants’ appeals in an irrevocable decision on the ground that those parts constituted a forest area and were considered inadmissible for the establishment of a right in rem by individuals.