Conflict over school free meal program deepens

By Kwon Mee-yoo

The conflict is deepening between Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon and district council chiefs, mostly belonging to the opposition Democratic Party, over providing free meals to primary and secondary school students.

Goh Jae-deuk, the Seongdong District head and chairman of the ward chiefs association, held a press conference denouncing Seoul City’s decision not to allocate a budget for the provision of free meals.

His condemnation came days after the city government distributed some 145 billion won for next year’s educational budget, but did not allocate any money needed to extend the free meal program pushed by the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education and district offices.

“This is obviously a rejection of the free school meal program, not that the city government is short of money,” Goh said.

The Seoul education office, led by liberal superintendent Kwak No-hyun, compiled a budget of 116 billion won, half of the amount needed for providing free school lunches to all primary school students in Seoul. The education office asked for the municipal government to share 30 percent, while district offices are responsible for the remaining 20 percent.

“However, the city refused to pay their share for free meal services,” Goh said.

Seoul City explained Friday that it is continuing the discussion about the free school meal program with the metropolitan council and education office.

It also said the claim of no budget for the free meal plan by some media outlets is not true. “We drew up the 27.8 billion won budget for free school lunches for 62,000 students, which accounts for some 5 percent of the total number of students. We also allotted a 46.3 billion won budget to raise the quality of the school meal service including 15 billion won for better ingredients and 3.3 billion won for ovens,” a city official said.