[ED] Relic of bygone days - The Korea Times

Minimize official residences and run them transparently

The Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission (ACRC) is conducting a fact-finding survey on official residences provided for high-level officials in central and local governments. The ACRC, which began the survey in February, will complete the task by June and announce results as part of its efforts to improve related systems. It's belated, but we expect the move to serve as an occasion to carry out major surgery on the operation of official residences.

Some official residences, including the presidential mansion, are essential for national function and security. However, it is questionable whether most other official residences need to exist. There's a lot of room for questioning whether the nation should provide official residences to the prime minister, the National Assembly speaker, the chief justice and the chief of the Constitutional Court, let alone foreign and defense ministers as it does now. In contrast, the United States provides official residences only to the president and vice president, and in Japan, only the prime minister and chief justice use them.

Unlike in the past, the provision of separate residences is not essential for guarding VIPs thanks to the development of transportation and communication. The standards for the operation of official residences are also ambiguous, with details not transparently disclosed, leading to continuous controversies over their private use and wasting taxpayers' money. For example, Chief Justice Kim Myeong-su spent about 1 billion won ($810,000) on remodeling his official residence and let his son live there for more than a year for free.

The government should reduce official residences to a minimum. That will prevent the waste of taxpayers' money and help dispel the sense of privilege among ranking officials. In addition, as the next government will relocate the presidential office to Yongsan, various government officials can share the guesthouse at Cheong Wa Dae to reduce the need for separate official residences. Also, the government should set standards for the operation of official residences by, for instance, prohibiting their use by the occupants' adult children and transparently disclosing operating expenses.