Gov’t Seeks Bill to Stop Violence in Redevelopment Project Disputes
By Kim Rahn
Staff Reporter
The government is seeking a law banning third parties from intervening in disputes surrounding redevelopment projects, a move to prevent ``professional demonstrators'' from escalating conflicts between builders and tenants.
The government and ruling Grand National Party plan to revise the law to keep third parties away from disputes between interested parties ― developers, tenants and local authorities ― in redevelopment plans, according to a government official, Wednesday.
The scheme has come as the government sees that the recent clash between tenants and police in residential and shopping district in Yongsan, central Seoul, resulted from a violent rally led by a coalition of evicted tenants coming from across the nation.
The coalition, better known as Jeoncheolnyeon, is comprised of tenant activists who lost their residences due to urban renewal projects. It assists protests of tenants in similar situations, but is sometimes said to lead violent clashes. The government and police said the group taught the Yongsan tenants how to build a lookout post on top of a building where they staged a sit-in.
``Violent rallies involving redevelopment projects have reached a point that cannot be tolerated. We are going to come up with comprehensive steps to stem such tragic incidents,'' a government official said.
Separately, a GNP official said that the steps, which will take shape in February, will focus on preventing third parties from influencing the process of talks between residents and developers.
Police and the prosecution are hunting the coalition head, Nam Gyeong-nam, for the Yongsan incident, which resulted in the deaths of six people, including a police officer.
They suspect that Nam received money regularly from the Yongsan tenants in return for orchestrating the protest on their behalf. They already confirmed that six tenants collected 60 million won ($45,000) last year as protest funds, and are investigating whether part of the money was funneled to Nam.
The authorities were also tipped that Nam and other leaders of the coalition demanded the developers pay off-the-books money in exchange for stopping the protest.
Compensation Overhaul
On the other hand, the government will overhaul the ways and methods residents and tenants in redevelopment areas are compensated for such building projects, with dozens of urban renewal projects planned nationwide, including 26 districts in Seoul under the ``New Town'' project.
The Yongsan tragedy is also raising calls that the nation should improve systems for compensation and other issues in urban redevelopment projects.
Seoul City, which planned to have several more districts under its New Town project and make an announcement next month, is likely to change the plan. It is under increasing pressure to overhaul the controversial projects, which critics say ignite all kinds of disputes among the involved parties by their very nature.
The city government is devising measures to help set reasonable compensation for tenants and allow them to have new homes and shops at low prices.
However, opposition parties and coalitions representing the interests of the evicted tenants and residents are moving to intensify their demand that redevelopment and New Town projects be scrapped across the nation. Developers tend to pay as little compensation to tenants as possible to maximize profits from the building projects, while tenants who are forced to leave their residents demand compensation to cover all of their present and future losses.
The government and the governing GNP have agreed to set up a special committee to mediate disputes in such projects.