As I read Dr. Allott's article “Towards a definition of Absolute Ownership” I felt increasing dismay because it postulates and makes appear immensely difficult, a problem which in actual working practice barely exists at all. For over sixty years Settlement Officers in the Sudan have been successfully determining ownership without the help of any definition, and in Kenya, during the last five years, the ownership of over a million plots has similarly been decided by committees. Even in West Africa, where there has been no process of systematic adjudication, ownership has been determined in over three thousand cases in Lagos, and ownership is not defined. Indeed I am not familiar with any statute anywhere which does define it.