[2022 National Audit] Seobeomsoo: "Ansan City Misuses Sewol Ferry Disaster Support Budget"

Seobeom-su, a member of the People Power Party

[Asia Economy (Ansan) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] It has been alleged that Ansan City in Gyeonggi Province used the 'Sewol Ferry Disaster Victim Support Budget' in a haphazard manner.

On the 14th, Seo Beom-su, a member of the People Power Party representing Ulju-gun, Ulsan, stated at the National Assembly's Land, Infrastructure and Transport Committee's audit of Gyeonggi Province, "Looking at the usage details of Ansan City's Sewol Ferry victim support budget in 2020, more than 300 million KRW was spent solely on SNS projects such as building the Joint Recovery Body website and the Hope Bridge online performance sharing meeting," adding, "The bigger problem is that the contracted company for these projects was a firm that earned less than 100 million KRW in 2019, and now that company no longer exists."

He continued, "Various research projects related to Ansan City's Sewol Ferry victim support budget are full of issues, including 98 million KRW for resident-led village travel memory walk research and development, 94.79 million KRW for external dissemination model and guideline research and development, 100 million KRW for youth life respect program development, and 99.5 million KRW for the 2020 Hope Ansan policy party to overcome a risk society," criticizing, "They also concentrated similar-scale contracts in 2021 and 2022 to an organization called Hope Institute, following 2020."

Seo particularly criticized, "During the first phase of the Sewol Ferry victim support budget project (2017?2019), in the election year of 2018, Ansan City distributed from as little as 500,000 to 1 million KRW up to 5 to 7 million KRW to 25 neighborhood administrative welfare centers in Ansan, promoting village community projects," and added, "Considering this, it raises suspicion that the mayor of Ansan used the (Sewol Ferry victim support) budget for his own election campaign."

He then questioned, "What was Gyeonggi Province doing while Ansan City was executing such reckless budget spending?" and pressed Governor Kim Dong-yeon, saying, "Gyeonggi Province should have supervisory authority over Ansan City, so did they neglect their duties?"