Lee Jae-myung: "Hwacheon Daeyu even called me a communist... I will institutionalize public land development"

[Asia Economy (Suwon) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] Lee Jae-myung, the Democratic Party presidential primary candidate and Governor of Gyeonggi Province, said, "After witnessing the flood of slanderous attacks against the 'Daejang-dong Private Participation Public Development Project,' which blocked preferential private development projects and reclaimed 550.3 billion KRW for the benefit of (Seongnam) citizens, I have made up my mind," and promised, "I will institutionalize measures to change laws and systems to make land development a public development."

He added, "The 'Public Development Profit Return to Residents System,' which Gyeonggi Province will introduce starting this month, could become a national standard," expressing expectations that "this will be the starting signal for dismantling vested interests in construction (civil engineering and architecture, etc.)."

On the 20th, through Facebook, Governor Lee began discussing the recently controversial Daejang-dong development project, saying, "We had previously promised to reclaim about 450 billion KRW in development profits and promoted a public development with private participation (Daejang-dong private participation public development), and seeing real estate prices rise, we changed approval conditions to impose about an additional 100 billion KRW burden."

Regarding the private developer taking on the Daejang-dong project, he argued, "With a development method where land use changes and land prices soar simply through permits, and 100% of the profits go to the private sector, it was impossible to break the chain of corruption and collusion."

He especially noted, "A solid cartel was formed connecting construction and implementing companies, banks, and even media that make money through sales advertisements," adding, "I wanted to break this cartel at least in Seongnam City, but due to various constraints, basic local governments could not carry out all development projects."

Governor Lee explained, "Therefore, we came up with an alternative where the public takes a significant portion of the profits, while the private developer bears all the risks, including financing, project execution, and even the risk of real estate price declines."

He said, "Ultimately, by adopting this project implementation method, we replaced public projects estimated at 92 billion KRW and returned development profits exceeding 550 billion KRW to the citizens," and shared, "During this process, I even heard from the representative of Hwacheon Daeyu that '(Lee Jae-myung) is a communist.'"

Furthermore, Governor Lee stated, "The principles I have consistently upheld as Mayor of Seongnam and Governor of Gyeonggi Province, I will now realize throughout the Republic of Korea," introducing, "Over the past three years, Gyeonggi Province has implemented measures such as eradicating illegal activities by speculative land investors, operating a land transaction permit system, recommending the resolution of multiple homeownership among high-ranking officials, investigating suspected false real estate transaction reports, and constructing the third phase of new towns led by local governments."

He also added, "We are proposing and promoting basic housing, basic income, national land holding tax, blind trust systems for real estate owned by high-ranking officials, and the establishment of a real estate supervisory agency."