Lee’s Land Trading to Be Hot Issue
By Kang Hyun-kyung
Staff Reporter
A controversy over property assets of leading presidential hopeful Lee Myung-bak of the Grand National Party (GNP) was sparked after reports said dubious activities were going on in Lee's real estate transactions in the past.
The controversy has had a snowball effect as the former Seoul mayor was inactive in offering explanation of the matter in person.
``We are speechless as the media updates additional suspicions over the status of real estate of the former Seoul mayor and his relatives almost every day,'' said Rep. Kim Jae-won, spokesperson of former Party Chairwoman Park Geun-hye.
Close aides of Park called a series of suspicions over the process of Lee's property acquisition as ``Real Estate Gate.''
An online media ran a story Friday that Lee's eldest brother possessed real estate in Jeju Island.
``From Seoul to Jeju, we are curious how much real estate the leading presidential contender and his family possess,'' he went on.
``As many are wondering how come Lee could possess such huge property asset, it is time for the presidential contender to report the accurate figures regarding his property asset and how he and members of his family were able to acquire huge real estate,'' Kim urged.
Early this week, Kyunghyang Shinmun paper ran an exclusive coverage indicating that the former Seoul mayor might be connected to property speculation in the past years.
Lee's brother-in-law Kim Jae-jeong had purchased huge scale of property, and the land acquisition equaled one-fourth the size of Yeoido in Seoul during mid and late 1980s.
The time frame coincided with the ongoing national land management projects and new harbor projects.
According to the report, although Kim possessed such massive property, he was heavily in debt. Even his housing was under seizure after he failed to repay his personal debt.
The media also raised additional suspicions that Lee might be involved in fraudulent real estate transactions in the past decade.
The former Seoul mayor sold out a portion of his property to a third person in early 1993 when he served as a lawmaker.
The new owner had not registered the property for 10 years under his name and he resold the real estate to Lee's nephew after 10 years.
Lee's nephew received huge material compensation later as the land became designated part of Seoul city government's development plan while Lee was serving as mayor of the city.
Lee's camp responded the suspicions are no more than a conspiracy.
``Lee inherited the area from his father who passed away and the size of the land is as small as 43 pyong (about 141 square meters). After Lee sold the estate to a third person, the former Seoul mayor did not known to whom the ownership of the property went,'' spokesman of Lee said.
The camp also said a total of 34 districts in Seoul City were designated as sites for the development plan while Lee was serving as mayor of the city. Therefore it is nonsense to argue that Lee included the small area to for wealth gains.