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Land disputes rise with Vietnam's booming economy

December 29, 2006
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Hanoi (dpa) - Police came early to cordon off the neighborhood, just in case there was trouble, and by mid-morning Friday, the roar of bulldozers on the small Hanoi street was cut with the shouts of outraged shopkeepers.

"Let our people see the transparency," yelled a woman as she watched the row of small brick shops reduced to rubble.

Nearby, other shopkeepers who were losing their businesses scurried to carry away sheets of corrugated tin and goods under the watchful eye of police.

"There's no compensation from the authorities," complained Le Thu Hang, 37, who since 1984 has sold baby formula and cookies from a tiny 10-square-meter shack she built by the side of the road.

The dispute over Friday's destruction of an illegally constructed row of shops on Hanoi's Nguyen Quy Duc Street was intensely local - only about 130 shops in all were destroyed - but the scene was similar to ones played out all over the country.

Disputes over property have been rising with Vietnam's rapid economic growth, as demand for land for both private and public projects increases. Villagers ordered to move off of property the government has reallocated often complain of official corruption and low compensation.

And increasingly, land fights are boiling over into once-rare street protests as Vietnam's weak legal system has been overwhelmed by the volume of disputes.

That's what happened this week in the fight for the Nguyen Quy Duc Street shops.

Four of the shopkeepers were arrested Thursday this week as about 100 of them staged a protest in front of the headquarters of Hanoi's communist People's Committee.

Public protests are banned in authoritarian Vietnam, but land disputes are one of the main issues that lead to social unrest - and one official admits the problem is getting worse.

"More and more people are protesting over land issues," admitted Dang Hung Vo, deputy minister of natural resources and environment in Vietnam.

Vo could not estimate the number of land-rights' protests, but said, "The situation is tense. It is not declining, but increasing."

In most land disputes, the complaints are similar: local authorities have ordered them off their land and the protesters are unhappy with the compensation offered. Often, villagers accuse local authorities of illegally selling off the land to business interests or of pocketing compensation money themselves.

But while land protests tend to be similar, they are also not simple - as the case of Nguyen Quy Duc Street showed.

Most of the evicted shopkeepers did not have legal title to the property. Police said they built their tiny businesses illegally on state-owned land.

And while many of the shopkeepers complained about no compensation, some received up to 5 million dong (350 dollars) - one local resident said those who received nothing owed back taxes on their business revenue.

Hang, the shopkeeper from Nguyen Quy Duc, admitted she had no property title, but said her long-term occupancy gave her de facto rights. She complained that authorities in the local commune didn't consult residents when they decided to raze the shops and build a tree-shaded sidewalk instead.

"Our income is from this shop," said Hang, who said she makes 1 million dong (about 70 dollars) a month. "We don't need trees. We want to keep our businesses."

Officially, all land in communist Vietnam is owned by the state, but since the 1986 "doi moi" economic reforms, people have been able to hold transferable titles to 99-year leases.

The problem is, many long-term residents and business owners don't have official title papers, said Vo, the deputy minister.

"In urban areas, about 50 per cent of the land is not titled or has been illegally occupied," Vo said.

To complicate matters more, a land law passed in 2003 in fact gives residents who can prove residency from before 1993 the right to gain title to their land, even if they originally occupied it illegally.

But gaining land titles is a fraught process, Vo said, adding the government needs to clarify the procedure and also find ways to mediate between local authorities and angry householders in land disputes.

"The law system is not suitable and not keeping up with the reality," Vo said. "There are a lot of obstacles to be solved." // © 2006 DPA

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