RELOCATION problems in urban cities have gained much attention in the past year, especially after two residents, one from Nanjing, of Jiangsu Province, another from Anhui Province, set themselves on fire to protest against being "unfairly" moved out of their old houses (Pages 4-6, January 23-29, written by Pan Haixia and Hu Yan, and Pages 6-7, October 9-15, written by Lu Chang and Yao Lan).

The flame of anger was not easily extinguished. The central government has continued to receive complaint letters from around the country. By August 31, 2003, the State Letters and Complaints Bureau had received a total of 11,641 letters of complaint. While in the whole year of 2002, it received 13,513 such letters.

Some people even went to Beijing, petitioning in a collective way, which vexed the government, who found themselves in a dilemma over how to handle the process of urban reconstruction, a necessary part of China's modernization. It also faced problems over the funding of compensation for relocated residents.

In order to ease the tension, the Shanghai government has appealed for the establishment of a consultation body made up of 152 lawyers, to help residents resolve their puzzles over legal issues.

Some experts said this was only a superficial move, and that while still marking an improvement it was unlikely to completely solve the underlying problems.

Until this point only a few of the 5,000 lawyers in the city have been willing to take on relocation cases, because most of these have been defeated in the courts. They have believed it would be hard to win such cases because developers and relocation companies often have government backing.

The government sometimes has "unfairly forcibly intervened" to make large profits by standing between the residents and developers.

According to critics, the core problem was actually that so far no specific laws on relocation have been issued but only vague administrative regulations. The proper roles and rights of residents, developers and the government have yet to be clearly identified.

Many relocation companies have appeared, with the task of persuading residents to move out of their original houses by negotiating with them for compensation payments.

Residents in equivalent situations might end up with varied compensation awards, due to their different negotiating abilities.

Such differences have caused numerous disputes, making appeals for a set of detailed and standardized compensation policies ever more urgent.

The rocketing housing prices in Shanghai, many times higher than the compensation residents have been able to win from the government or from developers, have made residents unwilling to move out of their cramped old houses.

Residents can also choose to accept apartments in distant districts rather than monetary compensation. However, the lagging development in these areas, especially in respect to their transportation systems, have often made people unwilling to accept this alternative.

On the other hand, relocation staff have said the disputes are frequently caused by unreasonable requests from relocated residents with excessive expectations.