Uri Party Operatives “Parachute” into Management of Korea Racing Association

Row after row, the ruling Uri Party operatives are being appointed to the administration of the Korea Racing Association (KRA), the business lobby for professional horse racers.

With the approval of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, the KRA on June 2 named Kim Do-hoon, 51 years old, to head the race track due to open in Busan next year, and Lee Jong-woo, 46 years old, to succeed the post of the current business administrator who will retire.

The association has five administrators, all members of its administrative board. Among them, three were promoted in-house.

Kim, a graduate of an engineering college, used to work at a company in the Changwon Industrial Compound. He is a party operative who has served as a member of the city council of Changwon, an administrator of Changwon YMCA’s civil affairs division, as well as a district head of the Millennium Democratic Party and the Uri Party.

He was a chief campaign manager in the South Gyeongsang Province.

Lee, a former civil servant, served as a member and the speaker of the county council of South Jeju County. He headed the founding committee for the Uri Party’s Jeju district.

In August of last year, the government elicited controversy as it approved the appointment of Lee Bong-soo, 48 years old, the former presidential agrarian policy aide who also headed the Kimhae chapter of the Korea Agrarian Management Association and the Kimhae district of the MDP as the vice president of the KRA.

“Although in-house promotion or the hiring of professional managers is a better solution, the old [sinecurist] practice has yet to vanish,” Kim Ki-hyon, assistant president of the KRA’s labor union, said, “We will demand open hiring soon.”

Jeong-Hoon Kang manman@donga.com