THE municipal government announced Friday that it had reclaimed a total of 1,899 low-rent apartments occupied by civil servants not entitled to use them.

The government has also revised some rules relating to low-rent housing in order to better keep track of the management of such apartments.

Mayor Xu Zongheng ordered an investigation last October into irregularities in the distribution and use of low-rent housing, after the issue came to light. There were complaints that civil servants, who had purchased luxury apartments for their own use, held on to the low-rent housing in order to earn extra money by subletting them out.

Of the 1,899 flats reclaimed, 590 were put into a pool of 6,006 cheap-rent apartments for the use of the needy. The rest have been allocated to eligible civil servants and employees of government agencies.

Some 21 civil servants were made to pay more than 100,000 yuan (US$13,170) in rent collected from subletting the apartments.

"There had been a loophole in the policies, as previously the municipal government did not forbid civil servants to access cheap-rent housing even after they'd already purchased and owned an apartment," an unnamed senior official was quoted by the Daily Sunshine as saying.

A government regulation published last year stipulates that civil servants who purchase their own housing will not be allowed to occupy low-rent apartments.

The official said the government will in the future increase the rental fees of low-rent apartments occupied for civil servants in order to reduce the profit margin for those subletting the apartments.

Shenzhen Daily