The Control Yuan has censured the Executive Yuan for dereliction of duty and lack of law enforcement after a private firm was found extracting water on public land for several years without approval.
The Control Yuan report issued earlier this month said Control Yuan members Chen Ching-chun (陳景峻), Pasuya Poiconu and Kuo Wen-tung (郭文東) during an inspection trip in 2022 uncovered an illegal extraction site at the mouth of Sanzhan River (三棧溪) to the Pacific in Hualien County’s Sincheng Township (新城).
Checks found the coastal site is public land under the jurisdiction of the National Property Administration, but a private firm was drawing water without approval or an operating license, allegedly for the sale of bottled water, the report said.
Photo: Hsieh Chun-lin, Taipei Times
The firm had obtained a permit from the Ministry of the Interior, but registered the excavation site at a different location, the investigation found.
The Executive Yuan in 2005 began development of the water industry, but provided no guidance for its regulation or supervision, leading to loopholes in local and central government implementation, and there is no oversight mechanism, the report said.
“The negligence and dereliction of duty for these years has allowed private firms to be able to undertake excavation and engineering work on public land without a permit, allowing for unlawful use of nation’s resources for profit. Therefore, these government agencies are deemed to be at fault and must shoulder responsibility,” the report said.
The Executive Yuan had convened meetings after the initiation of the probe to assess the situation. It assessed the legality of drilling for water at the site, the right to extract the water, the permit for public land usage, the right to conduct engineering work, and management of the operation, and the delineation of jurisdiction and legal responsibility between central and local government agencies.
“However, it still lacked progress establishing inspection and evaluation coordination mechanisms between the agencies, to ensure proper supervision, and in establishing a management system for engineering work and utilization of water. The responsible agencies must make adjustments to the changing conditions to prevent similar cases of negligence from happening again,” the report said.
The Control Yuan said that the National Property Administration had contacted the firm’s owner soon after the excavations began and sent notice on limitations for the site’s use. The administration issued a land-use lease, which required payment of a usage rights and lease fee, an annual fee for business use, and a guarantee deposit, along with the requirement to pay a compensation fee for five years of use, or NT$291.9 million (US$8.9 million).
However, the two sides differed in defining the area of use when calculating the lease, leading to administration officials tasking agencies to carry out on-site inspections to verify the correct figure to adjust the fees.
“Water is one of Taiwan’s national resources, and its derived products have market value. It is unreasonable to not require payment on the drawing and use of water,” the Control Yuan report said.
The Executive Yuan must establish application procedures for the approval and granting of leases to enable private firms to invest in the water industry, it said, adding there needs to be improved legal statutes to ensure product quality control, and for the government to establish a payment mechanism for private sector utilization of water resources.
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