Bac Lieu authorities sued for reclaiming project land without compensation

An investor has filed an administrative lawsuit against the People’s Committee of Bac Lieu province in the Mekong Delta for reclaiming allocated project land without compensation.

The provincial People’s Court has accepted the lawsuit filed by the Bac Lieu-Saigon General Hospital Joint Stock Company - investor of the Bac Lieu-Saigon General Hospital project.

The people’s committee had issued a decision dated November 26, 2021 to recover over 62,670 square meters of land in Ward 1, Bac Lieu town from the Bac Lieu-Saigon General Hospital JSC.

The plaintiff, an authorized representative of the company, has asked the court to cancel the decision.

According to the representative, the company got the committee’s in-principle approval in 2010 to invest in the 400-bed Bac Lieu-Saigon General Hospital and a housing area for officials, employees and specialists working at the hospital.

In August 2012, the provincial People’s Committee allocated nearly 25,000 square meters of land in Ward 1, Bac Lieu town to the company to implement the housing project.

In May 2013, the company was given more than 37,751 square meters of land adjacent to the housing area to carry out the hospital project.

The firm had paid part of the land use fees in line with regulations, the representative said.

“However, under the decision to recover more than 62,676 square meters, the company was not compensated for land and land-attached assets. This was a loss for the business,” he noted.

The company filed a complaint with the people's committee, but in another decision, the administration reaffirmed that the land recovery decision was issued in accordance with the law and it did not agree to compensate.

"Therefore, the Bac Lieu-Saigon General Hospital JSC filed an administrative lawsuit against the committee, asking the court to cancel the two above-mentioned decisions and protect our legitimate interests," he added.

Nothing happened for 10 years

The people’s committee, in a decision dated October 14, 2022, stated that as of July 2021, land for the Bac Lieu-Saigon General Hospital and staff housing area projects had been allocated for nearly 10 years, but the investor had done no work on it so far.

Under Article 64 of the Land Law, land that is allocated or leased by the state for implementing investment projects shall be recovered if it is not used for 12 consecutive months, or if the land use is 24 months later than the schedule stated in the project documents after the land has been handed over.

The two projects invested in by the Bac Lieu-Saigon General Hospital JSC have been delayed for a decade and their land use terms have not been extended by the competent authorities, so they were revoked in accordance with the law, the administration said.

Pursuant to Clause 4, Article 18a of the government's Decree No. 47/2014/ND-CP dated May 15, 2014 on compensation, support and resettlement upon land recovery by the state, when the recovery is made based on land law violations prescribed in Point i, Clause 1, Article 64 of the Land Law, land users are not entitled to any refund of land use levies and rent that have been paid. This also applies to any remaining land investment costs and the residual value of land-attached assets.

Hence, the two projects were not entitled to compensation when the allocated land was recovered.

Covering a total area of over 37,000 square meters in Ward 1, Bac Lieu town, the 10-storeyed hospital was designed to have 400 outpatient and 436 inpatient beds, plus a 21-room hotel with 112 beds. On June 24, 2018, the investor broke ground for the project.

With a total investment of over VND1,369 billion ($52.27 million), the project's first phase was expected to be put into operation in late 2020. However, until now, the area remains empty land overgrown with weed.