Daejeon Mayor Lee Jangwoo Says President Must Personally Decide to Break Competitive Structure over Administrative Integration

Urges Minister of the Interior and Safety Yoon Hojung to Uphold the Original Draft of the Administrative Integration Special Act

From left: Lee Jangwoo, Mayor of Daejeon; Yun Hojung, Minister of the Interior and Safety; Kim Taeheum, Governor of South Chungcheong Province (Photo by Daejeon City)

On February 6 at 4:00 p.m., Daejeon Mayor Lee Jangwoo held a meeting at the Government Complex Sejong with Minister of the Interior and Safety Yoon Hojung and South Chungcheong Province Governor Kim Taeheum, where he urged the government to uphold the original draft of the Special Act on the Administrative Integration of Daejeon and South Chungcheong Province and officially delivered a related proposal.

This meeting was arranged ahead of the National Assembly Public Administration and Security Committee's review of the special act, in order to discuss securing the practical competitiveness of the integrated local government and current issues related to administrative integration.

Through the proposal, Mayor Lee stressed the urgent need to enact a "Basic Act on Administrative Integration" for balanced national development, in order to eliminate discriminatory factors such as differences in authority between regions and to establish a legal foundation that can be commonly applied to integrated local governments.

He also proposed that the powers necessary for permanent fiscal independence, such as the transfer of national taxes amounting to 887.74 billion won annually to expand "fiscal autonomy" for region-led growth, should be explicitly stipulated in the special act.

From left: Lee Jangwoo, Yun Hojung, Kim Taeheum (Photo by Daejeon City)

In addition, for the "transfer of authority" necessary to realize a local government system at a quasi-federal level, he emphasized the need to revise toxic clauses that undermine local autonomy and to reflect substantial administrative powers that would allow the region to determine its own future.

He also strongly requested four key measures, including the position that the President should personally make a decision to break the competitive structure surrounding administrative integration and to resolve regional conflicts by convening a meeting between the President and metropolitan and provincial governors.

Mayor Lee said, "A mere physical merger without guaranteed high-level autonomy cannot fulfill the calling of our times," and added, "We ask for the Ministry of the Interior and Safety's full cooperation so that the original proposal put forward by Daejeon and South Chungcheong Province can be adopted in the National Assembly's legislative process without any alteration."