Seoul City said Wednesday it had confirmed signs that the Gangnam district office conducted an online smear campaign against Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon amid deepening conflicts between the two parties over various infrastructure projects.
The Seoul Metropolitan Government said it verified circumstantial evidence that the Gangnam district government had systematically posted slandering online comments against the city government while advocating Gangnam district Mayor Shin Yeon-hee from October to November.
A total of 11 district officials posted slandering comments on portal website Naver, with six of them each posting over 70 malicious comments, the city claimed.
The city said it would conduct another round of probes and consider taking legal measures against the district depending on the results.
The city’s move came after a local news outlet reported Tuesday that the Gangnam district office had attempted to sway public opinion online over controversial city projects that have clashed with each other.
The district office, however, denied the allegations, claiming the officials merely posted their personal opinions.
Since 2012, the city and the district have been at odds over how to develop the slum village Guryong, which is located within Gangnam.
The confrontation escalated last year over another project, when the city said it would share the public fund to a neighboring region that the city received from Hyundai Motors after the carmaker purchased the land in Gangnam. The company had offered to pay 1.7 trillion won ($1.44 billion) in public contribution fees in return for changing the legal use of the site.
While the city insisted that the majority of the fund would be used on Hyundai Motors’ land as part of its plan to transform the district into a hub for the meetings, incentive tours, conventions and exhibitions industry, Gangnam has argued that the fund should only be used on its region, as it originated from its land.
They are also currently clashing over building a second municipal community center in an exhibition center in the district.
By Lee Hyun-jeong (rene@heraldcorp.com)
