Land Expropriation Law Amendment Series Part 2: Civil Society Version Opposes Reckless Expropriation with Six Firm Stances

Lead photo / Chung Sheng-hsiung

Editor's note: Last June, the incident in Dapu, where excavators destroyed farmland, is still fresh in everyone's memory. To this day, expropriation cases across Taiwan, China have not stopped, and dozens of rural villages and communities have faced forced expropriation. Civil society groups have proposed a draft amendment to the "Land Expropriation Act," demanding that it must meet the prerequisites of public interest, necessity, proportionality, and full compensation. This article analyzes in detail the differences between the civil society version and the Executive Yuan version of the draft amendment to the "Land Expropriation Act." NewsMarket will also continue to track the latest developments in the coming days, and we ask everyone to pay attention together.

Text / Chu Shu-chuan

The closely watched "Land Expropriation Act Amendment Bill," without article-by-article discussion in a Legislative Yuan committee, was resolved by the Kuomintang Legislative Yuan caucus on November 11 to send both the Executive Yuan version and the civil society version directly to a second reading, losing the opportunity for full discussion through transparent and open procedures in committee. The Legislative Yuan will begin cross-party negotiations on December 12, then move to a vote, rushing to adjourn on the 14th. Farmers from various places opposing reckless land expropriation came to the Legislative Yuan today to demand that the Land Expropriation Act should not be passed hastily, and at the same time announced: see you at Ketagalan Boulevard next Monday.

Whether the two versions are discussed in committee makes a key difference because committee discussions are open, video-recorded, and audio-recorded, allowing outside oversight; and through article-by-article discussion, a better version can be negotiated. Once a bill is sent directly to a second reading, it enters cross-party negotiations, which are not open and amount to closed-door discussions. And once negotiations break down, it goes directly to an article-by-article vote on the two versions. Given the Kuomintang's advantage in the Legislative Yuan, the Executive Yuan version has a high chance of passing.

Yesterday (December 7), farmers from Miaoli Dapu, Houlong Wanbao, and Houli in the Third Phase of the Central Taiwan Science Park, who had faced improper land expropriation, held a press conference in front of the Legislative Yuan and put forward the "six firm stances" on the "Land Expropriation Act."

The six firm stances on the "Land Expropriation Act":

1. Implement the protection of prime farmland and maintain national food security: insist that special agricultural zones must not be expropriated
2. Establish substantive standards for evaluating public interest and necessity: insist on clear standards for evaluating necessity and public interest
3. Establish a substantive mechanism for public participation: insist on a substantive negotiated purchase procedure and a hearing system that fully implements public participation
4. Implement the principle of full compensation: insist that the market price be objectively assessed by three or more real estate appraisers
5. Establish clear resettlement standards: insist on paying reasonable relocation fees and resettling those left without housing due to expropriation
6. Correct the bad law of zone expropriation: the "pre-sale" development method has no legal basis and must be stopped immediately. The use of public land should return to the due process of the Land Act, and the provisions allowing reserved land to be arbitrarily sold, leased, or used to establish superficies should be deleted

Professor Hsu Shih-jung: Direct second reading is a shame for democracy

Hsu Shih-jung, a professor in the Department of Land Economics at National Chengchi University, said that land expropriation is a deprivation of the people's right to work, property rights, and basic human rights, so land expropriation must be handled with considerable caution and must meet six prerequisites before it can be carried out. The government should also view the issue of land expropriation from the perspective of protecting basic human rights.

The six requirements include: compliance with legal provisions, public interest, necessity, the principle of proportionality, it must be a last resort, and only finally full compensation. None of these six prerequisites can be missing. But the amendment version proposed by the Executive Yuan meets only the first requirement and none of the other five. Yet this version was actually sent directly to a second reading. "I am very heartbroken. This kind of democracy is shameful."

Hsu Shih-jung revealed that recently, regarding the Land Expropriation Act amendment bill, he visited Minister of the Interior Jiang Yi-huah, who responded that he was willing to revise the draft content. Hsu Shih-jung said Jiang Yi-huah agreed that during cross-party negotiations, the above "six firm stances" would be included in discussion. "We want to help the government and the Legislative Yuan write the requirements of the Land Expropriation Act into the law."

Hsu Shih-jung called on both parties, which both use fairness and justice as their campaign themes: "Please show your conscience and your concrete power to act, and properly amend the draft Land Expropriation Act."

Farmers: If the bad law is not amended, what protection is there for the people's property?

Wanbao farmer Chang Mu-tsun said that Miaoli County, under the pretext of development, forcibly expropriated people's land, including Wanbao and Dapu, destroying fields and wiping out land. But the land of County Magistrate Liu Cheng-hung's family is in the high-speed rail special zone. Other people's houses were completely demolished, while his family's land was preserved. He also knows that having land expropriated is a very painful thing. "Those in power should put themselves in others' shoes and not impose on the people things they themselves would find painful."

Huang Kuo-shu, spokesperson for the Land Justice Alliance, demanded an end to reckless land expropriation. Yeh Hsiu-tao of the Miaoli Dapu Self-Rescue Association said that Dapu farmers still have not gotten their farmland back, and four households have still not completed negotiations. "We oppose the government forcibly expropriating our land. This is no different from bandits."

Peng Hsiu-chun of "Chang Pharmacy," one of the four households whose negotiations have not been completed, took out the land title and said that Premier Wu had promised to preserve the original house but broke his promise. "The title is in my hands, but the land has become the county government's (forced expropriation, with compensation forcibly deposited). I live in fear every day. If the bad law is not amended, what protection is there for the people's property?"

Main disputes between the civil society version and the Executive Yuan version of the "Land Expropriation Act Amendment Bill":

In the past, the biggest disputes between civil society and the government over the Land Expropriation Act were threefold:

1. The public interest and necessity of expropriation cases
2. How to allow full public participation
3. The expropriation price after consensus is reached.

On the surface, both amendment versions respond to these three demands, but a careful comparison reveals key differences. As follows:

One, the public interest and necessity of expropriation cases

Regarding the public interest and necessity of expropriation, in the past the government had the final say, but most expropriation cases have been questioned as being in the name of false public interest, so establishing an objective set of evaluation standards has become very important. Both versions actually list major categories of evaluation standards, including social, economic, cultural, ecological, and sustainability. The difference is that the civil society version adds sub-items under the major categories, making the evaluation standards clearer.

In addition, past expropriation (especially industrial zone development) has often been questioned on the grounds that land resources are limited, and if there are still idle vacant lots, private land should not be expropriated again. Therefore, the civil society version adds that private land may be expropriated only if "no other appropriate public land or state-owned enterprise land can be used." The Executive Yuan version has no such regulation. In the past, whether it was the Central Taiwan Science Park Administration or the Miaoli County Government, when questioned, they repeatedly stressed that there was no idle land left in the industrial zone. If that is so, would adding this regulation not exactly match both sides' wishes?

Two, preservation of special agricultural zones

Over the past year, both President Ma and Premier Wu Den-yih have promised that in order to raise the food self-sufficiency rate to 40% by 2020, special agricultural zones should be preserved and not expropriated. Both versions mention protection for special agricultural zones. The civil society version clearly states that "special agricultural zones must not be expropriated," with exceptions considered only for major and urgent matters such as national defense and water conservancy.

But the Executive Yuan version opens many back doors, making the protection of special agricultural zones seem merely nominal. For example, the Executive Yuan version says that "agricultural and pastoral land in special agricultural zones must not be included," but the exceptions include national defense, transportation, public utilities, environmental protection undertakings, public health, and more, covering a very broad range. Take environmental protection undertakings as an example: industrial waste landfill sites are also environmental protection undertakings, so can they be located in special agricultural zones?

The biggest dispute is that the Executive Yuan version adds "those required for major construction approved by the Executive Yuan are not subject to this restriction." As everyone knows, what counts as major construction is designated recklessly, and the government decides unilaterally. In the past, almost all the development projects that caused the greatest controversy were major national construction projects, including the Kuokuang Petrochemical Project, the Third and Fourth Phases of the Central Taiwan Science Park, and so on." If this is not clearly evaluated, then amending the law to protect special agricultural zones is the same as not amending it at all.

Three, promoting public participation

In order to respect the wishes of the people whose land is being expropriated (not merely to hear their opinions), both versions include a public participation component. The Executive Yuan version says: "the owner should be notified in writing to state opinions." The civil society version proposes a method with a firmer legal basis and greater rigor, namely holding hearings. Based on past experience, the opinions stated by the people usually come to nothing, and opposing expropriation is useless. Therefore, if the amendment still stops at listening to opinions without further regulating how those opinions should be handled, true participation is likely still far away.

Four, openness and transparency of the land expropriation committee

The Ministry of the Interior's land expropriation committee is the final gate in the expropriation procedure. However, this committee has long held closed-door discussions, does not open participation to the public, and the media may not conduct interviews. It holds great power, yet the people cannot supervise it, and appointed officials make up as much as 60% of the committee members. Therefore, the civil society version requires that at least two-thirds of the committee members be civil society members from various different fields.

To promote the openness and transparency of the land expropriation committee, the composition of members is a basic requirement. In addition, like environmental impact assessment committees and district committees, it should incorporate citizen participation and open media interviews.

Five, full compensation

Price is only the issue at the very end of land expropriation. Only when all the items mentioned above have been taken care of is it in line with justice to then discuss price, because only when both buyer and seller are willing to trade does one then discuss price. If farmers are unwilling to be expropriated, where is the transaction?

And even if the Executive Yuan version is willing to change to "expropriation at market price," what is market price? It is investigated by the local government and submitted to the "Land Price Evaluation Committee" for assessment. Today many land expropriation cases are initiated by local governments. If local governments again conduct the investigation and evaluation, whether it can win the people's trust leaves much uncertainty.

The civil society version's approach is more objective, providing that the land-requiring entity should commission three or more real estate appraisers to conduct the appraisal, and then submit the entire appraisal report to the central competent authority as reference for deliberation. Deliberation by the central competent authority rather than the local competent authority can also allow it to stand on a more objective position than the local government.

(This article was originally published on the author's Environmental Reporting blog)