LookAtVietnam – Illegal building and digging along the dike in Ung Hoa District, in the south of the city, is putting locals at risk of landslides and compromising the effectiveness of the flood barrier, city officials are warning.

Sand is dredged from the Hong (Red) River side in Ha Noi’s Long Bien District. Illegal building and digging along the city’s dike is damaging flood barriers and putting area residents at risk.

According to the city’s Dike Management Department, of 4,534 incidents of illegal digging and dumping along the dike system, half occurred along a 36 km stretch in Ung Hoa District.

Officials said most violations involved illegal dumping of refuse and construction of houses on the dike. There were also reports of residents illegally removing gravel and digging irrigation channels and fishponds.

The department’s deputy director, Phung Xuan Dung, said the dike played a crucial part in preventing the city from flooding during the wet season, and that its effectiveness was being compromised by illegal occupation and building on the embankment.

Lack of enforcement

Article 7 of the Dyke Law bans the construction of houses along the dike and the driving of overloaded vehicles in the area.

Dumping of construction waste in the district is also prohibited, as is unauthorised digging.

Bui Quang Vinh, from the district’s Dike Management Division, said the law was difficult to enforce because residents were often in possession of legal land use rights certificates.

“There are about 800 households living in the dyke corridor in the district,” who are responsible for much of the illegal dumping of waste in the area, said Vinh.

He added that officials are often reluctant to enforce the law, because in many cases they are related or known to those damaging the dike.

However, Vinh played down the risk of flooding posed by illegal digging and dumping along the dike. He said the 15 landslides in the area since 1971 had been minor and that they had not compromised the effectiveness of the barrier.

However, Vinh said a number of houses built on the dike would be knocked down for safety reasons and that the residents would be relocated. However, he said the process was being hampered by a shortage of funds. “It will take a lot of time as the money for compensation is great, and we have no land for relocation,” he said.

Dung said there were as many as 3,000 concrete houses - many of them illegally constructed - along the dike’s 469.4km length.

Last year, authorities in the former Ha Tay Province, which is now part of Greater Ha Noi, dealt with 324 cases of illegal construction along the dike, including 68 in Ung Hoa District.

In the first quarter of this year, Ha Noi authorities spent nearly VND64 billion (US$3.7million) in repairs to 30 sections of the dike and on irrigation work, said Dung.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News