These day, the Sejong City problem is causing a controversy. We cannot help being interested since it is related to local society. But, do you know exactly what the Sejong City problem is? Can you understand completely the political debate about Sejong City? To solve these questions, this CP reporter will dig into the Sejong City problem. Let us find out what the problem is.
Sejong City of the Roh Mu-hyun Government
Where did Sejong City begin? This problem started in 2002. In 2002, Roh Mu-hyun, who was a presidential candidate of the Democratic Party, announced that as a presidential election pledge he would relocate an administrative town to Chungcheong province. An administrative town means a city that is part of the double capital system which divides administration, legislation and jurisdiction in two cities. After all, it was a pledge to overcome uneconomical and inefficient problem caused by Seoul concentration and to achieve balanced regional development. This new administrative capital special law passed with 167 yes votes of the 194 votes in the National Assembly in December 29, 2003.
However, this special law was found unconstitutional as unveiled by the Constitutional Court in October 21, 2004. Court Head, Yoon Young-chul of Constitutional Court said, "The government must conduct a national referendum before relocating the capital, since Seoul is the nation's capital and is considered part of the de facto constitution. This special law did not go through national referendum, therefore the law violated the people's political rights." The court said, "Our people want decide about relocating capital by national referendum. So if the president doesn't call a national referendum, it would violate the right to vote and is a deviation from democratic freedom." The Constitution Court considered the construction of a new administrative town construction as capital relocation, and they decided it is unconstitutional by this premise. Constitutional Court said "The special does not determine the scale of relocated governmental institution individually, but it requires enough movement for the new administrative town to be in charge of political and administrative facilities For that reason, the new administrative town relocation means capital relocation."
The judicial battle over the capital relocation ended with a violation of the constitution, and the government's plan lost it's legitimacy. At that time, this unconstitutional verdict left bewilderment and scars on aa lot of people.
Especially local residents who live with the expectation of a new administrative town like Yeongi-gun of Chungcheongnam-do fell into confusion. The people who had already prepared to leave their hometown for the administrative town became creditors by unconstitutionality. At that time, the amount of loans of National Agricultural Coopertive Federation in Yeongi-gun were about 100 billion won. There were conflicts about the relocated administrative town between residents. Also the speculation frenzy in Chungcheong province drove many construction and real estate businesses over the edge.
On this judgment, Roh Mu-hyun Government strongly resisted and took follow-up measures. Finally, the National Assembly decided to construct Sejong City, the Multifunctional administrative city in 2005. In July 20, 2007 the ground-brealdng ceremony of the Multifunctional Administrative city was held. It seemed that everything was going along nicely.
Sejong City during the Lee Myung-bak Government
In July 22, 2009 the Sejong City law passed in the public administration & security committee of the National Assembly. It mainly consisted of plans to make Sejong city a metropolitan city and having legal status.
However, two months later, Prime Minister candidate Chung Un-chan said he would revise the Sejong City plan and that caused a controversy. From his economist's point of view, he said this original plan is not efficient so it must be revised partially and various plans must he established.
However, Chungcheong province residents and opposition parties demanded the Prime Minister candidate's withdrawal and the promotion of the original Sejong City plan. In addition, former Grand National parry Chairperson Park Geun-hye made it clear that she opposed the revised Sejong City plan. She said if the original Sejong City plan's self-sufficiency function was not satisfied, we would have to compensate the self-sufficiency function by adding businesses, universities and research institutes. She emphasized that the government had to add something extra to the original Sejong City plan. She said politics involve trust, so the Grand National party must keep their promise. As a result President Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye are pitted against each other over the Sejong City plan.
On November 4th, the government officially announced the revision of Sejong City plan. The Sejong City plan had pushed ahead with Multifunctional Administrative city for four years and eight months, but revision of Sejong City plan was inevitable. Prime Minister Chung Un-chan said he had no alternative for revising the Sejong City plan. So he made a promise that he would announce an alternative late in January, 2010. After all the government has gone back to square one with the relocation of its administration department and announced an amendment of the Sejong City law on January 11, 2010.
Overall Contents of the Revised Sejong City Plan
This new Sejong City will accommodate several major companies (Samsung, Hanwha, Woongjin and Lotte), educational institutions (Korea University and the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) and cutting-edge tech nology research institutes instead of the relocation of administration department. To execute these plans, the government will provide some advantages to major companies and universities: development rights, tax reduction as they change all sorts of laws. Sejong City will be divided into six regions shaped like ring: state administration, culture/international exchange, municipal administration, university/research, medical treatment/welfare and cutting edge knowledge based. In January, 2010 a CP reporter visited Sejong City and the base infrastructure of Sejong City was almost completed at that lime. The government expects the project to be completed in 2020. The government's development plan is to make Sejong City a cutting edge futuristic city with a population of 500,000. From this they will make dynamic force for new growth. In Sejong City, a Happy Town public relations office and Mealmaru tower standing 42 meters high where you can see all over Sejong City are being built to promote the city.
Controversies and Problems about the Revised the Sejong City Plan
The unexpected Sejong City revision plan is arousing a lot of controversies and criticism. Many people who are opposed to the revision plan say the revision plan scraps core values such as balanced national development, decentralization and capital overpopulation solutions to achieve political goal preventing relocation of administration development. Also, undue preferential treatment toward Chungcheong province is becoming an object of public concern. The Lee Myung-bak Government is being criticized, since they plan to favor certain town for conglomerates by using taxpayer's precious money. Also, preferential treatment for Sejong City may cause businesses turn away from other regions and flock to Sejong City. We can call this phenomenon the 'black hole of Sejong City.' This causes a reverse discrimination of toward other provinces. In addition there is a concern about the incapacitation of other innovative cities, because businesses that will be attracted by Sejong City will turn out to be similar to other innovative cities' businesses. The government's plan to push ahead with its revision plan also intensifies society's conflicts. This revision plan was made after only nine discussions in two months compared to the original plan that was made after 487 discussions attended by approximately 1000 people from 2005 to 2007. It is a very serious problem that they make decisions about important affairs of state after having just a few discussions in a short time. Also they did not go through the normal democratic procedures. This revision plan makes people lose trust in the Lee Myung-bak Government. President Lee had promised to carry out the original Sejong City plan about 20 time since presidential election, but he broke his promises on the pretext of ineffective administration last year. So a lot of people feel deceived by the government.
Various Responses to Sejong City
There are various responses to Sejong City. The former Grand National party Chairperson Park Geun-hye vehemently opposes the revision of the Sejong City plan. The pro- Park Geun-hye group in the Grand National Party agrees with her opinion. So the government faces difficulties in getting parliamentary approval of its proposal to re-fashion Sejong City. Therefore conflicts between the pro- Park Geun-hye group and the pro- Lee Myung-bak group are still a problem. The democratic Party and the Liberty Forward Part, as opposition parties, oppose revision of the Sejong City plan and they have brought up a proposal to dismiss the prime minister.
In every region of Korea, severe conflicts are causes by the Sejong City problem. It is true that Chungcheong province's public sentiment is still negative toward the revision plan. They are getting angry, since they think revision plan is a scheme for regression and cancellation of its Multifunctional Administrative city. It can be seen as just a declaration war against Chungcheong province and other regions. Except Seoul residents, other regions' residents also are angry, too. They are worried about projects being pushed ahead in each region similar to the project in Sejong City. The Gyeongsangbuk-do assembly said, "The Sejong City revision plan causes fears of district-reverse discrimination and a harmful effect to local economy Other cities' focal projects should not overlap with Sejong City's businesses." The capital area, excepting Seoul, also dissatisfied with the revision plan because the government just wants to expand capital area and deny balanced regional development. Only Seoul welcomes this revision plan.
The direction of Sejong City
The Sejong City plan has caused many arguments and a lot of attention from the beginning. Everyone knows its importance, since this is a very significant issue. The development strategy of Sejong City must be drawn up in the right wat so it is beneficial. If we consider everyone's interests and not just one region's profit, we can build a more advanced and beautiful Sejong City.
By An Na-ri CP Reporter
ahn-nan@cnu.ac.kr