The administration in Phu Quoc City, off the coast of Kien Giang Province in southern Vietnam, took coercive steps on Monday to demolish 14 more illegally-constructed villas in Duong To Commune.

The city mobilized nine backhoes and other equipment to dismantle the 14 villas covering nearly 7,300 square meters of land in total.

The area of these villas ranged between 430 and 1,000 square meters each.

The owners of these villas had earlier failed to provide papers proving their legal land use rights, according to the Phu Quoc People’s Committee.

Huynh Quang Hung, chairman of the Phu Quoc People’s Committee, attributed the long-lasting coercive demolition of these villas to the city’s shortage of human resources, while the villa owners are living in different localities.

The city has detached officials to the residences of the villa owners to collect information to complete procedures.

Last year, a special task force of Kien Giang Proviance discovered that 79 villas, spanning some 19 hectares of land managed by the state, were illegally constructed in Duong To Commune.

On November 19, 2022, the Phu Quoc People’s Committee pulled down two villas whose owners were Vu Dinh Khanh and Le Xuan Hong. The two villas covered an area of some 500 square meters each.

To date, the city has forcibly dismantled 16 out of the 79 illicitly-built villas.

The Kien Giang police also pressed charges against three individuals for their alleged involvement in the illegal construction of the 79 villas, Le Quoc Anh, vice-chairman of the provincial administration and head of the special task force, confirmed on November 11 last year.

The three suspects, whose identity remains unknown, were found to have duped customers into buying state-managed land.

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