The Federation of Korean Industries (FKI) appears to be demonstrating its alignment with the incoming Yoon Suk-yeol administration by taking a favorable stance on the controversial presidential office relocation to Yongsan, according to industry watchers Thursday.
The FKI, once a mighty business lobby group representing Korea's conglomerates, has been sidelined since it was embroiled in a major corruption scandal that led to the impeachment of former President Park Geun-hye five years ago. Now it has been vying to recover its status as the corporate business-friendly Yoon administration comes to office.
President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol
The Korea Economic Research Institute, affiliated with the FKI, published a report recently, titled "Analysis of the economic effect of the relocation of the presidential office to the Ministry of National Defense in Yongsan," commissioned by Kim Hyun-seok, a professor at Pusan ??National University.
The report stated that the relocation of the presidential office to Yongsan, would generate 1.8 trillion won annually in tourism income, and gross domestic product (GDP) would increase up to 3.3 trillion won.
The report's intention seems to be to side with Yoon, as it is interpreted as empowering the president-elect, who has been in conflict with the Moon Jae-in administration over the relocation of the presidential office.
Federation of Korean Industries Chairman Huh Chang-soo
The report is rather an unusual research topic for the institute, which mainly conducts research related to large corporations.
"We have conducted several research projects on societal issues before, and the relocation issue has been a hot topic so we decided to request a report," an FKI official explained.
The report assumed that if Cheong Wa Dae were fully opened to the public after the presidential office was moved out, the effect of attracting domestic and foreign tourists would be as powerful as the restoration of Cheonggye Stream. The stream was opened to the public in October 2005 and has been visited by 17 million people annually as of 2015.
"Cheong Wa Dae has beautiful scenery and special value as it is the place where past presidents worked," Kim said. "In particular, when developing tourism products connected with Cheong Wa Dae, it is expected that there will be high demand from foreign tourists."
The report analyzed that with the full opening of Cheong Wa Dae, domestic and foreign tourists will reach 16.7 million annually (16,192,000 domestic and 516,000 from overseas), and tourism revenue will reach 1.8 trillion won. Of the 1.8 trillion won, domestic and foreign tourists each accounted for 900 billion won.
However, some industry officials are skeptical of the timing of the report, which can be seen to appeal to the incoming new administration.
"The figures seem farfetched as well as the timing of the report," a senior industry official said on condition of anonymity. "The Korea Tourism Organization predicted that the economic effects from the relocation could bring in 200 billion won a year, which is a fraction of FKI's 1.8 trillion won prediction. The results could differ on how they measured and conducted the study but the figures from the two reports differ too much."
