On April 23, a dispute over land contracting sparked heated discussions.
According to the "China Three Rural Release" report, in Shuangsheng Village, Jianhua Town, Kailu County, Tongliao City, Inner Mongolia, villager Lao Zhang and more than a dozen other villagers have contracted more than 5,000 acres of land. The most widely spread sentence is when the villagers were prevented from planting, a deputy director of the village committee said: "What can I do if I come to 110, I will collect money if I am asked to do it." ”
As soon as the news came out, public opinion was in an uproar, with some netizens complaining about the villagers' experiences, and some people being dissatisfied with the attitude shown by the local village cadres.
At 6 p.m. on April 23, in response to the above incident, the Information Office of the People's Government of Kailu County issued a notice to respond to the problem. The reason for the additional fee is that Kailu County is a pilot unit for the efficient use of new cultivated land, and pays for the use of new cultivated land, but in this process, some large households are unwilling to pay fees.
As a result of the incident, the grassroots cadres treated the masses with an arrogant attitude and rude language, and dismissed the deputy secretary of the town party committee involved, and the masses of the village agreed to adopt litigation to claim their rights and interests and resolve the contradictions. The village party secretary responded to the media and said, "The money is collected by the county, and it will continue to be implemented."
The key point of contradiction between the villagers and the village committee, town government, and county government lies in the additional collection of land contract fees.
Why do villagers still need to pay the contract fee again during the duration of the contract, even though the contract fee has already been paid? As the official response of Kailu County said, can the local government charge a fee for the use of the newly added farmland?
01
From barren beach to cultivated land, does the change of land ownership bring about additional costs?
In the incident, the villagers contracted 5,600 acres of land, and the contract period is from 2004 to 2034 for a period of 30 years, and the contract fee is paid in batches, which has been paid in 2022. However, in 2024, the village committee's reminder notice to the villagers shows that the new cultivated land in this contracted land is 4,650 mu, and each mu of land will have to pay 200 yuan per year, which is calculated to pay nearly 1 million yuan per year.
This is a huge expense, and the villagers have already invested money in buying fertilizers and tools, and the 1 million reminders that have fallen from the sky have made them feel bizarre and outrageous.
According to the official response of Kailu County, and the previous statement of the town government officials, the additional fee is related to the change of land ownership of this land.
In 2004, when villager Lao Zhang signed a contract with the village committee, only 110 acres of the 5,600 acres of land were arable land. Over the past ten years, under the management of the contracted villagers, the land has been gradually improved. During the contract period, in the third national land survey in September 2018, a large amount of land in this land has been changed from barren beach to cultivated land, and 4,650 acres of new cultivated land has been added. In the view of the town government, this change has increased the value of the land, and the contractor will naturally have to increase the contract fee.
But for the villagers, the change from barren land to cultivated land did not fall from the sky, but the result of their efforts to improve. After more than ten years of hard work, they turned the former barren land into watered fields, invested more than 10,000 yuan per acre of land, and more than a dozen families, a family invested one or two million.
When the land ownership of the contracted land changes, can the county government and village committee charge additional fees?
Lawyer Bi Wenqiang, vice president and secretary general of the Beijing Property Law Research Association and director of Beijing Shengting Law Firm, told Phoenix.com's "Eye of the Storm" that the current situation investigation is only a confirmation of the current situation of land use, and the so-called three adjustment results of the relevant person in charge of the town are identified as cultivated land, and the law does not give the land status investigation the same effect as the land registration certificate, and whether the nature of the land has changed, the land certificate should still prevail. The villagers' committee's act of forcing the contractor to pay a separate fee is a matter outside the contract and does not fall within the scope of the contract, and the villagers do not need to pay separately.
Lv Qiuxiang, a lawyer at Zhongzheng Law Firm, said that if the village committee believes that the use of the land has changed and the value of the land has also changed, the two parties can negotiate to re-sign the entrustment contract, but it does not have the force to enforce it.
A village committee cadre in a southern province also told Phoenix.com's "Eye of the Storm" that he had never encountered a similar situation, when the land is not specifically subcontracted to a farmer, or the public property of the village committee, the village committee has the right to take back and re-issue the contract, but if the contract is signed, regardless of whether the nature of the land changes, it should be done according to the contract according to the law, "If there is an additional charge, it is a breach of contract, and the villagers should be informed in advance, and compensation for economic losses should be made."
02
Is it a change of circumstances, or is it a business risk?
Regardless of the change in the nature of the land, both parties still need to abide by the contract.
However, Shi Lei, the lead lawyer of Beijing Wu Shaobo Law Firm, told Phoenix.com's "Eye of the Storm" that there may also be another situation. Since the land contract was signed in 2004, the original price of the initial contract was very low, and it is possible that the principle of "change of circumstances" is met. This is also the basis for the laws and regulations mentioned by the deputy secretary of the town's party committee and members of the political and legal committee in the face of doubts.
According to Article 533 of the Civil Code, after the conclusion of a contract, if the basic conditions of the contract have undergone a major change that was unforeseeable by the parties at the time of conclusion of the contract and is not a commercial risk, and the continued performance of the contract is obviously unfair to one of the parties, the adversely affected party may renegotiate with the other party, and if the negotiation fails within a reasonable period of time, the party may request the people's court or arbitration institution to modify or terminate the contract.
For example, in the rental market, the original rent of the house was 80 yuan, and with the good trend of real estate, the market rent has risen to 1,000 yuan.
In this case, the report showed two payment documents for the villagers, one was paid in 2015 and the cost was 96,800 yuan, which was the contracted land payment from 2009 to 2015, and the other was paid in 2022 with a fee of 60,000 yuan, and the time shown on the side was 18-20 years, and the contract fee was all settled.
Based on the first payment note, if 96,800 yuan is all the contract fee of 5,600 mu of land, the contract fee for one mu of land is 2.5 yuan a year, and according to the second calculation, the contract fee for one mu of land is 4 yuan a year. In the report, the villagers also said that at that time, it was 5 yuan and no one was willing to contract the land.
From today's perspective, the land contract fee at that time was indeed not high. If we only start from the contract fee, in the opinion of lawyer Shi Lei, the village committee's request for a fee of 200 yuan per mu is not completely groundless. In the case of land disputes in Xinjiang that he had previously contacted, the rent was more than 200 yuan per mu per year.
However, in his view, even if the situation changes, the village committee is a villagers' autonomous organization and a non-governmental organization, and does not have the effect of legal public power, and the unilateral termination of the contract by the village committee may not have legal effect.
But more importantly, the change of circumstances does not apply to this case.
According to article 533 of the Civil Code, whether a contract can be modified depends on whether the parties have "a material change that was unforeseeable at the time of the conclusion of the contract and is not a commercial risk".
Lawyer Bi Wenqiang told Phoenix.com's "Eye of the Storm" that the village committee and the town government believe that the barren beach is a "change of situation", which is groundless, and it is stipulated in Article 7 of the "Land Contract Contract" signed by the two parties that if Party B (referring to the contracted villagers) repairs roads and drills wells to connect electricity during the contract period, Party A (referring to the village committee) assists Party B in implementing it, and the town government will give a subsidy of 10,000 yuan free of charge. This means that the village committee and the town government should foresee that the growers will gradually improve the land after contracting the land, so this is not a change of circumstances.
Although Kailu County officials mentioned that Kailu County is a pilot unit for the efficient use of new cultivated land, and is charging paid use fees for new cultivated land, lawyer Bi Wenqiang said that the conversion of these lands from barren beaches to cultivated land was formed by the contractor's large investment in the early stage, so there is still no basis for the county government to charge fees during the contract period.
This was originally a contract dispute between the village committee and the contractor, and the strong actions of the village committee and the town government gradually derailed the incident. In the video, from the deputy director of the village committee, to the secretary of the village party branch, to the deputy secretary of the town party committee and the mayor, it is all shocking.
The deputy director of the village committee shouted, "What can I do if 110 comes, I will collect money if I am asked to collect it." The secretary of the village party branch said, "I don't understand the law either." The deputy secretary of the Jianhua Town Party Committee and the member of the Political and Legal Committee also said, "Don't look for me, I don't understand the law!" The law enforcement cadres both said that they did not understand the law, which made the incident present a sense of absurdity, and it was also one of the reasons for angering netizens.
To build a business environment based on the rule of law, it is necessary to have laws to follow and rules to follow. The local government unilaterally terminated the contract before the negotiation, ignoring the interests of the contractor, hurting the people's morale and inevitably causing damage to the local business environment.