New | Lychee park operator asked to return site to landlord
Rural strongman Leung Fuk-yuen who operated the Tai Tong Lychee Valley park in Yuen Long is asked to return the site to his landlord after he refused to remove illegal structures there.
Leung and his family, who ran the hillside recreation business, were accused of violating the land use. They were asked to close a restaurant and remove those unauthorised constructions on the site in 2012.
In a writ to the District Court, his landlord Lee Chi-ming claimed that since then she had repeatedly asked Leung to demolish the illegal structures to comply with the tenancy agreement. But Leung refused to do so.
Lee filed the writ against Leung and Tai Tong Lychee Valley Company, in which Leung was a shareholder and a director. She was seeking Leung and the company to return the land and pay an unspecified amount of damage.
The writ says Leung rented the land from an agent in October 2009 for 10 years at a yearly rental of HK$4,000. Lee became the owner of the land in January 2011.
Lee claimed the agreement states clearly that the land was an open storage area and was subject to restrictive covenants in the Block Government Lease which could only be used for agricultural purposes or as a garden.
Lee claimed that the District Lands Office in Yuen Long complained the tenant had breached the government lease in April 2012.
Leung and four others were fined between HK$30,000 and HK$80,000 in Sha Tin Court in August 2012 for defying a Planning Department order to close an illegal restaurant in the park.
The leisure park was at the centre of controversy after an Audit Commission report in 2012 that criticised the Development Bureau for lax enforcement of government land use.
