HCMC – The HCMC Tax Department has proposed cancelling the results of the Thu Thiem land auctions held late last year, citing the failures of the auction winners to make payments as regulated.
The taxman said the Department of Natural Resources and Environment should request the city government to make decisions scrapping the auction results of four land lots in Thu Thiem New Urban Area.
There were four companies winning the land auctions in December last year. Two of them – Viet Star, a unit of Tan Hoang Minh Group, and Binh Minh Trading and Development Investment Co. Ltd. – later dropped their winning bids.
The two other winning companies – Dream Republic and Sheen Mega – pledged to proceed with the payments of land use and registration fees for the two lots of land. However, 180 days have passed since the fee amounts were announced and no payments have been made though the HCMC taxman has repeatedly reminded them of the payments.
The tax department has also asked the city government for guidance to deal with the deposits, equivalent to 20% of the reserve prices, placed by the four companies.
In April, the tax department rejected the requests of Dream Republic and Sheen Mega to pay land use fees by monthly instalment.
Later the two companies wrote to the taxman promising to pay at least VND100 billion each by April 30 as a goodwill gesture. But they broke their promises again.
On December 10 last year, Dream Republic won the auction for the 6,400-square-meter land lot coded 3-5. The firm would have to pay a land use fee of VND3.82 trillion and a registration fee of VND500 million for the lot.
Sheen Mega, which won the auction for the 8,600-square-meter land lot coded 3-8, is subject to a land use fee of VND4 trillion, but exempt from the registration fee.
Viet Star Real Estate Investment Co., Ltd, and Binh Minh Trading and Development Investment Co., Ltd., won the auctions of the lots coded 3-9 and 3-12. Binh Minh would have to pay a land use fee of more than VND5 trillion and Viet Star VND24.5 trillion, and their respective registration fee was VND500 million.
