With the June 3 local elections ahead, preliminary candidates are already rolling out pledges. They range from launching a professional baseball team or attracting an ultra-large domed stadium to luring a semiconductor plant. Some even say they will clinch projects requiring investments in the hundreds of billions of won in a short period without specific plans. As a result, they are being criticized that "reckless pledges with slim chances of being realized are being made indiscriminately."
Lee Won-taek, a lawmaker and primary candidate for governor of Jeonbuk State from the Democratic Party of Korea, held a press conference at the provincial council on the 30th and announced as a pledge the launch of a "Jeonbuk-style 11th professional baseball club." Lee proposed forming the club as a cooperative instead of a single-corporation team operation, which carries a large expense burden. The idea is that if one in-province corporation contributes 5 million won a year, 1,000 corporations could raise 500 million won in contributions. Lee also said he would attract a domed stadium.
Pledges to attract domed stadiums are continuing in other regions. Jun Hyun-hee, a Democratic Party mayoral hopeful for Seoul, said she would dismantle Dongdaemun Design Plaza (DDP) and build a "Seoul Dome" on the site that could host sports games and performances. Kim Tae-heum, the People Power Party governor of South Chungcheong Province whose single-candidate nomination has been finalized, pledged to build a domed stadium with more than 50,000 seats near Cheonan-Asan Station. Park Seung-won, mayor of Gwangmyeong (Democratic Party), Baek Kyung-hyun, mayor of Guri (People Power Party), and Lee Beom-seok, mayor of Cheongju (People Power Party), who are in party primaries, are also pushing to build domed stadiums.
The problem is feasibility. Building a domed stadium requires a budget in the hundreds of billions of won. Although plans combining national and local funds with private investment are being presented, the specific financing structure and measures to address annual operating losses are unclear. In particular, domed stadiums are costly to maintain, and some analyses say they could become a long-term burden on local government finances. In addition, in North Jeolla Province, which has no baseball club, pledges to launch a professional baseball team have been repeated every election season, but none has led to an actual launch.
Pledges to attract semiconductor plants, the most talked-about promises in this election, are not much different. Both the ruling and opposition parties are putting the attraction of semiconductor plants in each region at the top of their agendas. From the Democratic Party, Noh Young-min, a gubernatorial hopeful for North Chungcheong, pledged to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to attract Samsung within 100 days of taking office, while lawmaker Min Hyung-bae and Kim Yung-rok, governor of South Jeolla Province, who are running in the South Jeolla–Gwangju integrated mayoral primary, pledged "attracting global corporations" and "building a 500 trillion won semiconductor industrial complex," respectively. Ahn Ho-young, a candidate in the Jeonbuk gubernatorial primary, is also calling for attracting a Samsung semiconductor plant.
Among People Power Party candidates, pledges for semiconductor plants are also pouring in. Yoo Young-ha, a Daegu mayoral hopeful, pledged to "attract a Samsung semiconductor plant and establish a branch of Samsung Hospital," while Lee Cheol-woo, governor of North Gyeongsang Province who is in a party primary, promised to "attract a semiconductor plant to Gumi." Kim Jin-tae, the governor of Gangwon Province, is also touting the attraction of high-tech industries such as a "Wonju semiconductor cluster."
Corporate investment is decided by long-term strategies such as securing sites, supplying power and water, supporting infrastructure, and securing skilled workers. And because semiconductor plants and industrial complexes take more than 10 years just to build infrastructure, critics say pledges to produce results within a four-year term are unrealistic.
Pledges offering one-off cash support are also coming one after another. In the Gunsan mayoral race in Jeonbuk, five of the nine preliminary candidates promised "cash dividends for citizens during the term." Kang Gi-yun, a Changwon mayoral hopeful (People Power Party), pledged to pay an "energy pension of 1 million won per person," while Oh Ha-geun, a Suncheon mayoral hopeful (Democratic Party), proposed a "livelihood recovery grant of 1 million won" as a pledge. However, critics say there is a lack of specific explanations about how to fund them or their sustainability.
Lee Joon-han, a professor of political science and international relations at the University of Incheon, said, "Voters are fully capable of discerning the feasibility of pledges, so candidates who put forward fanciful or populist promises should be filtered out through the election," and "such pledges are proof that the candidate is unprepared and should be restrained."