Disregarding requests from the Ministry of Justice, the Industrial Development Bureau (IDB) of the Ministry of Economic Affairs announced it will sell 350-hectares of reclaimed coastal land to Formosa Plastics Group (FPG, 台塑集團), the first time the government would sell public land inside an industrial complex to a private company.
The IDB on Wednesday denied rumors that it favored Formosa and stressed that this is the first case approved by the IDB simply because no private enterprise had filed such an application before. The public land will be sold to FPG in order to save taxpayers' money on the maintenance fee of the land, the IDB said. The agency caused a recent disturbance by selling coastal land to FPG for its Mailiao Harbor in Yunlin County.
But the Ministry of Justice has disagreed with the IDB's decision.
According to Minister of Justice Chen Ding-nan (陳定南), provisions in the Statute for Upgrading Industries (促進產業升級條例) allowing the rental and sale of industrial harbors obviously violate the Land Law (土地法) and had been revised on Dec. 31 last year. Industrial harbors currently can only be rented but not sold by private companies.
However, FPG has said it does have the right to purchase the reclaimed coastal land. The company filed its application in 1995 and signed the contract with IDB at the end of 1999, before the statute was revised. "Everything we do is legal," an FPG representative said.
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