Taxpayers pay the cost of corrupt construction

Directional blasting demolition of a high-rise building is completed successfully at 7 am on November 15, 2015 in Xi'an, in Northwest China's Shaanxi province. [Photo/Xinhua]

THREE HIGH-RISE apartment buildings nearing completion in North China's Tianjin municipality are to be demolished, because the buildings were in violation of their planning permission. In a comment, Guangzhou Daily condemns the waste of public money and resources, and urges stricter supervision:

Of course, the three illegally constructed buildings in Tianjin should be taken down. But those who bought apartments off-plan will find it hard to get their money back, and taxpayers will be paying the costs of demolition.

Therefore, it is worth finding out how the developer managed to bypass all the planning restrictions and redesign the construction at will. The constructed height of the three buildings would have put occupiers' lives at risk as a result, especially when the power is freely abused and exploited by some businessmen who care about profits rather than lives.

That the investor is being held criminally accountable, actually serves as a wake-up call to the supervisory authorities that the anti-graft movement must go further to nip corruption in the bud.

Such a waste of public resources could have been avoided. The rule of law needs to be applied, otherwise institutional reform will not curb corruption effectively.