Comments on the revised Constitution - Thematic about land

For the national interest, the State has the right to expropriate the purchase of land use rights and land-attached assets at a price that does not cause economic damage to the users. Such writing shows that the people are the masters, the people give the rights. allows the State to expropriate for the national interest. Thus, the expropriation of the people will have to be very cautious, considering...

1. Some main contents about land drawn from the provisions of the Constitution

- The 1946 Constitution did not mention anything about land, although the 1957 Constitution was not written, it was understood that land was multi-owned (at that time our country was still divided into 2 regions, not yet unified).

- Starting from the 1980 Constitution until now, it has been affirmed that: Land is owned by the entire people because the State is the representative owner. From the 1992 Constitution up to now, organizations and individuals are allowed to transfer land use rights.

- This revised draft Constitution has two new contents on land:

a) Recognizing that land use rights are property rights protected by law.

b) In cases of extreme necessity, the State recovers land with compensation (Article 58), in cases of extreme necessity, the State expropriates or requisitions with compensation (Article 56).

2. International experience with land issues

In the world, in addition to Vietnam, China, and Cuba, there are some places like Hong Kong, Singapore... that have public ownership of land; or in England, Australia, Canada, the land system belongs to the King, the Queen... (Crown Land) but not because of that, they have no problems because the land, whether private or public, is expressed in Land use rights are all included in the property. Land use right is a property right, so when registering (called Real Estate Registration), people clearly state the length and width of the house, the number of floors and height, what kind of trees are important. Importantly, on the size and area of ​​the land, where is the east-southwest north-west border, unlike the red book, our pink book is rather loosely written as "Certificate of land use rights and ownership of houses and other other assets attached to land”.

In the world, countries whether land is under public ownership or multi-ownership, they often encounter the problem of requisitioning and requisitioning land to do works for national interests. This requisition and requisition is in accordance with the law. The name of the law is different, but every country has it (even in our country during the French colonial period, during the Bao Dai period, and during the old Saigon government). According to the law, people who are forced to buy land for national purposes are rarely disadvantaged. For non-national community service projects, the only way is to "buy and sell" and call on the owner's community spirit.

Because of such clear regulations, there is little litigation or reaction in countries. In general, few, but not none. As in the South in the past, when expanding the Saigon - Bien Hoa road, the Saigon government only compensated for permanent houses with real estate registration certificates, temporary houses along the road were not compensated; People refused to move, the government used armed forces to pour gasoline on the house... As in France, an inter-provincial road has been completed, opened to traffic, but in the middle of the road still exists a 2-storey house with people live, electricity and water are cut off, they get water from stec, and run electric generators. In Russia (former Soviet Union), when building a large hydroelectric power plant, all the people were displaced, there were still a few families who did not go, cranes, bulldozers surrounded, the owner of the house climbed to hug him. Rooftops and construction sites also have to give up, in the US there are also protests against the expropriation of land for the sake that they think is not in the national interest...

3. Public opinion on land through this revised Constitution

After the draft amendment to the 1992 Constitution was made available to the public for comments, the content of the land received comments from a large number of citizens. Because land is owned by the entire people, the State is the representative of the owner, so some opinions say that it is the cause of lawsuits, disputes, and unfairness. The state is the local government which is decentralized, mainly at the district level, which is assigned the right to manage, grant and recover land. This is an opportunity for officials to combine with investors. So in order to solve this problem, some people have proposed to have multiple land ownership as it existed from the day the country was built until before 1975. Their argument is that if there are multiple land owners, The greedy officials will run out of food, there will be no longer long-term collective lawsuits, because whoever's land will be kept.

The overwhelming majority of opinions are overwhelmingly opposed to land acquisition for socio-economic development projects. Because according to everyone's opinion, people are willing to sacrifice their rights for the sake of the country, but they can't stand injustice, depriving them of their legitimate rights to enrich investors as well as investors. enrich the corrupt officials. That is reflected in the policy and inadequate compensation ... (this issue has been talked about too much by the press).

4. Our thoughts

a) Regarding ownership of the whole people or multiple ownership of land

Unlike other countries, Vietnam has its own peculiarities. Under the leadership of the Communist Party of Vietnam, our people successfully made the August Revolution, reformed the land, liberated the South, and built socialism. Land is a special means of production, due to the efforts of many generations to renovate and enrich the country during the history of national construction and defense; Today's land capital is the revolutionary result that our people have sacrificed their lives with sweat and blood to regain from the hands of the empire and feudalism. Therefore, the land does not belong to anyone, not to any class or class, but must belong to the entire Vietnamese nation. Only the State of Vietnam is eligible to represent the entire people's owners. It is also necessary to affirm that all lawsuits and disputes over land are not because of the phrase "all-people's ownership", nor because of the phrase "State management", no one has any questions about these two phrases. The country's slow development is not because of these two phrases, but on the contrary, if you know how to use them, these two phrases will help the country stabilize and develop dramatically. For the above reasons, we see that the provisions of the Constitution are correct, indispensable and suitable for the specific conditions of Vietnam. I think there is no need to discuss further.

b) Regarding land acquisition for public benefit, for socio-economic development projects

This issue needs to be analyzed more closely. Our country is a developing country, rather a slow-developed country, with very poor facilities, so it is in dire need of socio-economic development projects as well as public projects. For example, the project to build Ninh Thuan nuclear power plant, Son La hydroelectric power plant, Dung Quat oil refinery industrial park, high-tech park, or build a university of international stature... It is clear that the State must recover the land for construction, even if the project is foreign or private. Maybe just because a few families refused to relocate, the project had to be stopped, delaying the development of the country. But with public projects such as building kindergartens, kindergartens, meeting rooms of residential groups, etc., perhaps the State will also recover land from people. Here, an important issue arises: Who, which agency confirms it is a very important and necessary project. If the person who allocates the land, the person who recovers the land, and the person who confirms the necessary case are all the same person and are the same agency, the people can only die or have to do the same as in the case of Tien Lang, Van Jiang...

This is the loophole of this draft Amendment of the Constitution. But it is also difficult, because the Constitution is the original law and cannot be detailed, so the Land Law must detail this. For example: What is the case that is really necessary, who is the person to confirm that it is really necessary; What types of projects are socio-economic development projects, and what are the sizes of public projects?

There is a paradox that with land allocation, land can be recovered when necessary because the land belongs to the entire people and the State is the representative of the ownership rights. But the Constitution recognizes land use rights as property rights, and property rights cannot be revoked if the owner does not violate the law. Therefore, in order to avoid loopholes right from the drafting stage of the Constitution, to facilitate the concretization of the Land Law, I propose to rewrite Clause 3, Article 58 of the revised Constitution as follows:

In the national interest, the State has the right to expropriate the purchase of land use rights and land-attached assets at prices that do not cause economic damage to current users.

Such writing shows that the people are the masters, and the people allow the State to have the right to expropriate for the national interest. Thus, the expropriation of the people will have to be very cautious and considered. National interests can be national security, disaster prevention, bridge construction, even socio-economic development projects that promote the development of the country and the region. . The expropriation can be in cash, by land use rights elsewhere, by shares, by houses or equivalently converted resettlement apartments. If the above proposal is accepted, the phrase revocation of land use rights which has long haunted and made many people fear will fall into the past. The Land Law will have to specify this issue. I believe that with such content, it will stop the approval of the project as well as the rampant land acquisition as in previous years, causing real estate stagnation, waste of assets as well as lawsuits and complaints. prolonged complaint. Our country will enter the era of sustainable construction.

Engineer Nguyen Xuan Hai – Member of Executive Committee of VFCEA