Issues in the Service Contract for the Construction of Gyeongnam Japanese Military Comfort Women History Museum?

Construction Promotion Committee Raises Issues on Research Service Provider's Expertise

Gyeongnam Province: "Provider Selection is Legal, Current Service Separate from Previous One"

The Gyeongnam Region Japanese Military Comfort Women History Museum Construction Promotion Committee held a press conference at the Gyeongnam Provincial Government Press Center on the 5th, raising issues regarding the process of collecting materials on Japanese military comfort women in Gyeongnam and the research project for the construction of the history museum.

According to the Promotion Committee, on August 14, 2020, the former governor of Gyeongnam officially declared at the memorial ceremony for the Japanese military comfort women victims’ remembrance day that a prefectural history museum for Japanese military comfort women would be established, and related research projects were initiated in June 2021.

As many problems were pointed out in the final report of the research project, necessitating additional in-depth data investigation, Gyeongnam Province announced a bid for a research project on in-depth data investigation, excavation, and collection related to Japanese military comfort women victims in November last year, and held a project commencement briefing in January.

The Promotion Committee raised issues including ▲the research project being conducted by a company with zero related experts ▲the majority of proposal evaluation committee members lacking expertise ▲and unfair quantitative evaluation of proposals by the responsible department.

“Companies with domestic comfort women-related expert researchers and researchers with long research achievements participated in the bidding, but the company finally selected had unprecedentedly no research achievements related to comfort women except for the first research project,” they explained.

“Although the experience and expertise of participating personnel were assigned the highest scores in the quantitative evaluation of research project companies, this was not adhered to,” they criticized.

The Promotion Committee also pointed out that only 2 out of 7 proposal evaluation committee members had expertise.

“This violated the eligibility requirement that clearly stated all evaluators must have expertise in the relevant field,” they said.

The Gyeongnam Region Japanese Military Comfort Women History Museum Construction Promotion Committee is holding a press conference.
[Photo by Lee Seryeong]

The Promotion Committee stated, “They say they will not proceed with the construction due to low economic feasibility based on the results of the first project conducted by those without expertise,” adding, “Sociological and feminist validity are more important for the construction of the Japanese military comfort women history museum, so why is economic effect considered a key validity?”

“The company that was criticized by many members of the public-private consultative body for many problems in the first project was again selected as the second project contractor,” they said, expressing concern, “If a company that admitted to having no experts in the review evaluation committee is entrusted with the second project, won’t poor results come out again?”

“Although the province’s clear response regarding the construction of the history museum is still unknown, we hope the results of the in-depth data investigation research project will be properly produced and serve as the foundation for establishing the prefectural history museum,” they said, delivering a statement to the province after the press conference.

The responsible department, the Provincial Women and Family Bureau, responded, “The first project concluded that the feasibility of construction was insufficient, including economic feasibility and other factors,” and added, “The second project is currently underway to collect related materials and conduct oral recordings of victims’ acquaintances.”

Subsequently, Gyeongnam Province clarified through an explanatory statement, “The ongoing research project is not a feasibility study for the construction of the comfort women history museum but a research project for collecting materials on Japanese military comfort women victims and oral recordings of victims’ acquaintances.”

“It is separate from the feasibility study conducted in 2021 for the construction of the history museum,” they said, adding, “The research project company was lawfully selected according to relevant laws and bidding announcements, and is currently conducting investigations on comfort women victims from Gyeongnam, collecting materials, and recording oral histories of victims’ acquaintances.”

Although the research project company must hire workers with the necessary skills and experience to perform the contract, the unselected company mentioned by the Promotion Committee reportedly had many researchers who were not affiliated workers at the time of proposal submission.

The selected research project company is conducting the project with historians, feminist scholars, and those experienced in oral recordings of comfort women victims, they explained.

According to the province, the selection of the research project company is based on a combined score of 60 points for qualitative evaluation by proposal evaluation committee members, 20 points for quantitative evaluation by the ordering department, and 20 points for bid price evaluation, with the priority negotiation candidate selected according to contract-related laws.

The quantitative evaluation includes comprehensive assessment of participating personnel’s experience as researchers, number of participating researchers, number of related research projects performed, business status, and number of sanctions against dishonest contractors.

A provincial official stated, “We have disclosed all materials that can be disclosed according to relevant laws when requested through information disclosure requests and other means, and we are gathering diverse opinions through the public-private consultative body for the research project,” adding, “We will continue to create various consultation channels and strive to collect meaningful data through the ongoing in-depth data collection research project on Japanese military comfort women victims.”