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| / Korea Times file |
By Kim Rahn
President Moon Jae-in has ordered a state audit of the Four Major Rivers Restoration Project carried out under the Lee Myung-bak administration (2008-2013), Cheong Wa Dae said Monday.
The Moon administration said the audit is not targeting the former governments' policies or aimed at punishing then-policymakers, but made it clear that any illegalities, if found, will face "corresponding responses."
Sources said the audit reflects Moon's campaign pledge to eradicate "deep-rooted evils" of former conservative administrations.
The presidential office said Moon has told the Board of Audit and Inspection to look into how the river refurbishment policy was created and implemented.
The project for four major rivers — the Han, Nakdong, Geum and Yeongsan — was former President Lee's flagship project. Lee's administration poured more than 22 trillion won ($20 billion) of taxpayers' money into building 16 dams on the rivers to fight droughts. But environmentalists and critics say the refurbishment worsened water quality and increased algal bloom in the rivers every summer, threatening the water supply of the affected regions.
"The project was carried out hastily and roughly," Kim Su-hyun, senior presidential secretary for social policy, said in a briefing at Cheong Wa Dae.
He said it was a problem in the government system that the project was pushed ahead although negative environmental effects had been forecast.
"The Lee administration failed to maintain a balance in two policy goals — maintaining environmental values and securing water resources. The environment ministry should have conducted an environmental impact evaluation for at least four seasons for the vast state-run project, but such due process was omitted."
The government will issue a white paper after the audit.
Kim stressed that the audit is aimed at learning a lesson in making and carrying out government policies for consistency and balance, not at digging up specific individuals' illegalities. But he said, "If illegalities are found during the audit, we will take due action against those responsible."
As controversy arose over the project, the Lee administration conducted two audits, the fairness of which citizens doubted. The succeeding Park Geun-hye administration also conducted an audit but it focused on bid rigging by construction companies.
When asked whether Lee could be the target of the audit, Kim said he couldn't answer that.
Along with the audit, Cheong Wa Dae said it would unify the government functions of managing both water quality and quantity. So far, the environment ministry is in charge of water quality and the land, infrastructure and transportation ministry, in charge of securing water resources and coping with droughts and floods.
"The environment ministry will be in charge of all the functions. So the water resources-related departments under the land ministry will be moved to the environment ministry," Kim said.
President Moon also ordered the release of water at the dams at all times, which experts say will wash away algae and other toxic elements in the rivers. Releasing water was a common election campaign pledge among four major parties except for the Liberty Korea Party, the successor of the Grand National Party of which Lee was a member.
The authorities will begin releasing water at six of the 16 dams on June 1 before the summer starts. They will decide when and how to do so for the rest of the dams after examining each of their conditions by the end of 2018.
Liberal parties and environment groups welcomed the audit, while the conservative parties showed concern. The minor conservative Bareun Party said the audit can be seen as political retaliation against the former administration. "If the audit focuses on uncovering former government officials' irregularities rather than correcting the project's side effects, it could hinder the national unity which Moon has called for," it said in a statement.
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