A HOMEOWNER in Longgang District complained that his neighbor was approved to renovate a garden behind his home by the city’s urban planning, land and resources commission without following legal procedures, a local TV news program reported recently.

    The homeowner, surnamed Li, has lived in a residential estate called Lotus Villa for almost 10 years. Li said he and his neighbor had fought over the ownership of a derelict garden behind their apartments for years. They had also confronted each other in court several times, but neither of them was granted ownership of the garden by the court.

    Li was surprised when he saw a notice issued by the commission’s Longgang bureau Thursday, which noted that his neighbor had obtained the approval to renovate the garden. Li later found that some construction materials had already been placed in the garden and two workers were making preparations for the renovation project.

    The neighbor said that the garden wasn’t a part of his apartment, but that it didn’t belong to Li either.

    Li didn’t understand why the Longgang bureau had approved the renovation project despite the fact that the garden’s ownership remained uncertain.

    According to a staffer from the bureau, the officer who approved the renovation project had already resigned, and the bureau would reply to Li within 30 working days after conducting an investigation.

    The reporter also found that the notice issued by the bureau contained incorrectly written characters. A staffer said that it’s hard to avoid mistakes in these documents, but that the mistakes wouldn’t impair the notice’s effect.

    (Zhang Yang)