On the 3rd, juniper saplings are sparsely planted in a field in Gwarim-dong, Siheung, Gyeonggi Province, which is believed to have been purchased by LH employees. Reporter Lee Seung-yeop
The ripples caused by allegations of pre-speculation in the Gwangmyeong and Siheung districts of Korea Land and Housing Corporation (LH) employees are spreading more and more. As soon as the suspicion was raised, it was unusual for Prime Minister Jeong Sye-gyun and then President Moon Jae-in to immediately ordered an all-round investigation and severe punishment. This means that it is a matter with great destructive power.
It was a suspicion of real estate, which is the government’s Achilles heel, and subjects who implement real estate policies were involved. If speculation is confirmed to be true, the legitimacy of real estate policies that focused on blocking speculation for publicity as well as promoting the ‘2·4 housing supply measure’ could be undermined.
Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and Gwangmyeong and Siheung City officials also investigated
The government announced on the 3rd that it would expand the scope of the investigation to the third new towns in addition to the Gwangmyeong and Siheung districts where allegations of speculation by LH employees were raised. The 3rd new cities in the metropolitan area are Namyangju Wangsuk, Hanam Gyosan, Incheon Gyeyang, designated in December 2018, followed by Changneung and Bucheon in Goyang in May of the following year, followed by Gwangmyeong and Siheung at the end of last month. Outside the metropolitan area, there are two districts in Daejeo in Busan and Sanjeong in Gwangju.
The targets of the alleged speculation investigation were expanded to LH employees, as well as employees of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and related public institutions and their families. The investigation is led by the Office of the Prime Minister, and the Public Housing Promotion Team cooperates within the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. If it is confirmed as an illegal or unfair transaction, the company will take strict measures such as request for investigation and prosecution and charges.
Gwangmyeong-si and Siheung-si, Gyeonggi-do themselves conduct a total investigation of whether their officials acquired land in the new city’s planned district. Of the total area (12.71 million ㎡) of Gwangmyeong and Siheung districts, 8.11 million ㎡ belongs to Gwangmyeong City and about 4.6 million ㎡ belongs to Siheung City. This area has been mentioned as a promising candidate for a new city for many years.
The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, which started the investigation the day before, confirmed that 13 LH employees purchased the land before the announcement of the Gwangmyeong and Siheung districts. All of the land they bought were 12 lots. The total area is about 27,000m2, and the transaction period is from August 2017 to June last year. Most of the land is paddy fields and fields, and one lot is the land.
For those employees, the positional system has been completed. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport is investigating whether they used internal information to dump the land.
Current status of the 3rd new town and allegations of speculation by LH employees. Reporter Song Jeong-geun
Exceptional quick response, why?
When the participation solidarity and a group of lawyers for democratic society (Minbyun) exposed the allegations of speculation in the Gwangmyeong and Siheung districts of LH employees through a press conference, an emergency took place not only in the government but also in the Blue House and the ruling Democratic Party.
On the previous day, Prime Minister Chung ordered, “Quickly check whether there are similar cases in other housing development districts,” and on that day, President Moon also through Spokesman Kang Min-seok, △A thorough investigation of land transactions △Strictly respond to any violations △Prompt institutional measures were taken. I ordered.
The same is true for the Democratic Party’s leadership that it should be tied quickly. Democratic Party representative Lee Nak-yeon said on the day, “If the suspicion is true, it is a serious crime that seeks to obtain private interests by mobilizing secrets acquired during work,” and emphasized, “The government should promptly investigate the facts and, if necessary, investigate.”
According to the results of the investigation, the Party’s quick response to public sentiment in a day after revealing suspicions despite concerns that may shake even the Minister of Land, Infrastructure and Transport Byun Chang-heum, who was appointed last year as a relief pitcher for housing supply, is because it is a highly flammable issue that arouses public sentiment.
Whenever the government has issued 25 real estate policies so far, the eradication of speculation and realization of the public interest, which has been put forward every time, will return to a boomerang. If allegations of speculation by LH employees are confirmed to be true, and additional illegal and unfair land transactions are revealed in the third new city total investigation, it is observed that they have an explosive power that will emerge as a’lame duck trigger’ at the end of the regime. There is inevitable negative impact on the reliability of the housing supply measures that LH should take the lead right now. Cho Joo-hyun, a professor in the Department of Real Estate at Konkuk University, said, “If it is revealed that public-led redevelopment or supply is not fair, it will inevitably hurt the credibility of the policy, which is a very serious problem.”
Willow saplings are planted on the 3rd in a field in Gwarim-dong, Siheung-si, Gyeonggi-do, which is believed to have been purchased by LH employees. Reporter Lee Seung-yeop
I came up with a “reverse North Korean countermeasure”
Even if LH employees’ land purchase turns out to be a personal investment without using inside information, it seems inevitable that it is inevitable that it is an inappropriate investment as a subject of public works. New towns are basically a way of migrating indigenous peoples and developing housing sites by public institutions such as LH. This is because land expropriation is an investment in which the employee of the agency wants to benefit from where coercion is involved.
In any case, the government has urgently started to prepare countermeasures on the same day as public uprisings have arisen. Employees of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Public institutions related to the development of new housing sites, in principle, decided to promptly review measures to prohibit land transactions that are not for residence purposes and report them in advance if unavoidable. In addition, it plans to establish a regular investigation and response system for suspicious cases, and penalize personnel for illegal and unfair matters.
The scope of punishment is also expanded systematically. According to the current Special Public Housing Act, if information learned during business processing is used for other purposes or leaked to others, imprisonment for not more than 5 years or a fine of 50 million won or less. The government decided to come up with effective measures to prevent recurrence by expanding the scope of punishment. An official from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport said, “We will review the revision of related laws and regulations, and first of all, we will be able to implement it immediately through regular regulations such as personnel regulations for each public institution.”
Kim Ji-seop reporter [email protected]
Gangjin-gu reporter [email protected]
News directly edited by the Hankook Ilbo can also be viewed on Naver.
