Many public properties have been occupied without due compensation, a situation that has seen little improvement over the years, according to a legislative report released recently.
The report, prepared by the legislature's budget center, noted that the total surface area of public real estate that is currently being illegally occupied amounts to the surface area of nine Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall parks.
The land and residences at issue belong to various state-run enterprises whose annual budget must be approved by the legislature.
The lawmaking body will not review their spending budgets until next spring, as the central government's budget will dominate the current session.
According to the legislative budget center, Taiwan Sugar Corp has tracts of land totaling 1.2 million square meters being illegally occupied.
That accounts for 60 percent of the 2.14 million square meters of public real estate being illegally occupied altogether, the report shows.
Taiwan Power Company and Land Bank of Taiwan rank at second and third, respectively.
The former has yet to take back land properties of 170,000 square meters, while the latter has some 110,000 square meters of land being illegally occupied, the report says.
In addition, Chinese Petroleum Corp tops others in having the biggest number of buildings being illegally occupied.
A total of 275 residences in its possession have yet to be turned over to the gas company, even though their leases have expired, the budget center notes.
Taiwan Sugar Company comes second with 277 of its buildings being illegally occupied, trailed by Taiwan Tobacco and Wine Company, which has 260 buildings being illegally occupied in this way, the legislative report indicates.
The budget center attributes the misuse of the public real estate to inaction on the part of the state-run enterprises.
It notes that in some cases, the court has reaffirmed their ownership of certain properties, but the government-owned companies have been hesitant to evict the occupants.
Bank of Taiwan has some 450 pieces of real estate that are occupied illegally, many of which are located in downtown Taipei and Kaohsiung, according the legislative report.
The report says that some national enterprises fail to honestly report the real estate in their possession and recommends the government heed the problem to avoid waste of public resources.
Being aware of the situation, Premier Yu Shyi-kun earlier instructed the Cabinet's Central Personnel Administration to come up with a plan on how to more effectively manage official residences -- including those legally or illegally occupied or left vacant.
Government statistics show that 87,390 official residences across the nation are illegally occupied.
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