Gov’t plans for regional development pledges lack action plan

The regional development plan announced by the government Friday fail to present concrete implementation schedules, causing protests from local autonomous governments and lawmakers to spread.

The government disclosed separate implementation plans to emphasize its determination to carry out President Park Geun-hye’s campaign promises for regional development. However, it failed to include details such as implementation schedules and financing plans. There are now concerns that such a lack of concrete plans could intensify social conflicts through President Park’s five-year term as central and local governments are expected to have tug-of-wars over when to implement the projects and how to share funding burdens.

The Ministry of Strategy and Finance said Friday that it would cost 124 trillion won (108.6 billion U.S. dollars) to implement President Park’s 106 development projects. The ministry said that it would implement them even if it has to revise her campaign promises after conducting feasibility studies on the projects. The announcement is a major step back from its initial plan to disclose the schedules, methods and priorities of the promises. A ministry official noted that a concrete implementation plan could cause misunderstandings and controversies over the implementation plan.

Against this backdrop, local governments are confused. An official at the Daegu Metropolitan Government said, “We cannot decide how much we have to spend from our local budget and how much investment we need to attract from private-sector companies.” Some local governments in regions, for which the president’s campaign promises do not make economic senses, suspect that the central government might be trying to promise to implement the development projects but ultimately fizzle them out.