Relocation of National Assembly-Supreme Court-Supreme Public Prosecutor Office Deferred

Seventy-three Central Administrative branches, including the Presidential Secretary Office, were confirmed as national institutions to be relocated to the new administrative capital.

On the other hand, 11 institutions affiliated to the legislative and judicial branches will self-determine whether to be relocated or not by corresponding institutions, while the Supreme Public Prosecutor Office were temporarily deferred from relocation in order to be linked to the relocation of the judicial branch.

The Presidential Committee on Administrative Capital Relocation held the fifth conference on July 21 at the central government complex in Sejong-roh, Jongro-gu, Seoul and finalized its decision after deliberating on the “relocation of principle national institutions and basic construction plan of the new capital,” including the aforementioned matter.

On this day during the conference, the committee decided to relocate 73 institutions step-by-step from the year 2012 until 2014, including principle central branches and its affiliated organizations out of 254 administrative organizations in the nationwide unit belonging to the administrative branch. The Korean Broadcasting Commission and the National Human Rights Commission of Korea are both independent organizations classified to be relocated.

There are currently 18,072 employees working at organizations targeted for relocation in July.

The committee deferred the relocation decision of 11 constitutional organizations such as the National Assembly, the Supreme Court, the Constitutional Court, and the National Election Commission that were included to be relocated earlier and 12 organizations including the Supreme Public Prosecutor’s Office, an administrative organization.

One hundred eighty-one organizations, including the National Intelligence Service, Financial Supervisory Commission, the Central Officials Training Institute, and Korea Meteorological Administration, were excluded from the relocation target on the grounds of low necessity to be present with administrative organizations or of high costs in relocating. The commission composed the scale of the new capital to around 20 million ~25 million pyong for approximately 500,000 people to move into, and estimated the cost of relocation as 45.6 trillion won until 2030. Assistant Chairman Lee Choon-hee of the Presidential Committee on Administrative Capital Relocation stated, “Before presenting the agreement proposal of the National Assembly regarding the relocation of constitutional organizations, we decided to entrust the decision to corresponding organizations,” and added, “Concerning the organizations to be relocated, we are planning to make a public announcement in the Official Gazette this month after receiving approval from the president.”

Kwang-Hyun Kim Cheol-Yong Lee kkh@donga.com lcy@donga.com