Gwangju City Dismisses Head of Public Institution Dialogue Controversy Strategy Team

Question on 'Guideline' at Subordinate Agencies Meeting
Mayor Kang: "An Embarrassing Matter Without Excuse"

Gwangju City Hall exterior view.

Gwangju City has dismissed the head of the Strategic Promotion Division who caused controversy by restricting employees' questions during a meeting with affiliated organizations.

On the 22nd, Gwangju City announced that it held the head, Lee, responsible for the controversy during the 'Public Institution On-site Dialogue' and carried out a personnel reshuffle by demoting him to a non-executive position.

The city explained that it appointed Secretary Yoon Mira as the new head of the Strategic Promotion Division to ensure no disruption in work along with personnel renewal. It added that under the new head’s leadership, it plans to continuously promote the 'City-Public Institution Cooperation Strategy' to organically connect policy decision-making and execution in the public sector, gather creative ideas and energy, and smoothly carry out cross-departmental fusion projects.

Mayor Kang Kijung of Gwangju has been conducting 'on-site visit meetings' at 29 affiliated organizations since early this year. Although these meetings were intended to listen to the opinions of public institution employees, controversy arose when 'reference matters' were conveyed to some public institutions.

The Strategic Promotion Division preemptively instructed affiliated organizations that topics related to Gwangju FC, Mudeungsan, and childcare were 'absolutely forbidden topics' in the reference matters sent out. Additionally, requests such as staff increases, salaries, and office relocations were to be separately collected and reported, and were announced at the event as 'matters that must never be mentioned.' Furthermore, questions that were 'not pre-reviewed' and difficult for the mayor to answer were also restricted.

Upon learning of this, Participation Autonomy 21 issued a statement criticizing it as "an outdated administration disconnected from the times and a regressive administration that goes against local democracy."

Mayor Kang expressed his frustration in a post titled 'To All Gwangju City Hall Family' the day before, saying, "It is an inexcusable and shameful matter," and added, "For the past two years, I have been saying and striving that 'the subject of protocol should be the citizens, not the mayor,' and that 'we must part ways with the familiar,' but I cannot understand why such incidents continue to occur in our public service community."