Seochunsoo, Hamyang County Governor, "Integrity Slightly Increased Compared to Last Year... Will Do Our Best to Achieve Top Rankings"

Hamyang County Office building exterior view

[Asia Economy Yeongnam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Choi Soon-kyung] On the 9th, Hamyang-gun, Gyeongnam announced that it maintained its grade 4 rating this year, the same as last year, in the '2021 Public Institution Integrity Evaluation' conducted by the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission.

External integrity increased by 0.12 points compared to last year, internal integrity rose by 0.14 points, and overall integrity improved by 0.11 points compared to last year; however, the dream of entering the top tier in the evaluation was not realized.

Since the 7th local government term, Hamyang-gun has focused on restoring citizens' trust to shed the stigma of the lowest integrity rating, especially striving to improve integrity in areas vulnerable to external integrity.

Additionally, Hamyang-gun actively promoted integrity policies such as revitalizing the operation of the Integrity Planning Team, continuously carrying out the Kindness 5S practice campaign, innovative integrity education, and implementing the upper limit system for negotiated contracts.

However, as the COVID-19 crisis prolonged, citizens' fatigue increased, leading to growing distrust in administration. Furthermore, the audit by the Board of Audit and Inspection related to the Hamyang Wild Ginseng subsidy project, which has been ongoing since 2020, highlighted a negative image of the administration.

It is also analyzed that some public officials' personal misconduct negatively impacted the overall administrative trustworthiness of Hamyang-gun, thereby adversely affecting the integrity evaluation.

County Governor Seo Chun-soo expressed, "Although this result is not satisfactory, I thank everyone who has worked hard to improve integrity," and added, "We will make even greater efforts to enter the top tier of integrity next year."

Meanwhile, Hamyang-gun has begun a detailed analysis of this integrity evaluation result and plans to reflect it in the establishment of the 2022 comprehensive integrity measures.