Land withdrawal becomes hot topic
Le Thi Nga, Vice Chairman of the National Assembly’s Committee of Justice, made the proposal at a recent meeting held to discuss the draft amendment to the 1992 Constitution.
Nga said that much of the the recent increase in corruption cases was related to land use rights, mostly stemming from the current land withdrawal mechanism.
She added that before the institution of regulations on land withdrawal, the current system for land reclamation must be assessed and its faults addressed.
“Considering current regulations on land use rights, it only seems logical that forcible evaluation of land should only be used in cases concerning national defense or those which benefit the society as a whole, such as NGO projects," she suggested.
She went on to say that Article 23 of the current constitution stipulates that private property owned by individuals or organisations are not to be nationalised, except in cases of national defense, security or other public benefit, the government should purchase land from those parties who have legal land right use, and that compensation should be based on real market prices.
The current constitution is vague on issues concerning imminent domain, and does not address the administrative procedures to carry out these processes.
According to Nga, the current regulations are too vague to adequately address national priorities.
“Our regulations on land withdrawal for national benefit and socioeconomic development should be readdressed, as they are now too vague to deal with the modern economic situation, and can negatively impact land use rights of the people" she said.
Another National Assembly Deputy, Nguyen Sy Cuong, of Ninh Thuan Province, agreed, saying that the policy on revocation of land use rights should provide compensation in a reasonable way, based on market prices.
“It’s important to avoid situations in which individuals or organisations are not sufficiently compensated for the withdrawal of land use rights. There are thousands of individuals who've had their land use rights taken away, just to hand the same land over to people who divide it into sections for a profit," he said.
