Oh Se-hoon: Citizens With Homes and Land Are Not Enemies for the President to Fight

▲ Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon

Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon criticized the government's comprehensive farmland inspection today (September 27), stating, "The president should not look among the citizens for targets to crack down on."

In a post on Facebook earlier in the day, Mayor Oh argued, "President Lee Jae-myung's obsession with actual residency is now leading to an obsession with actual cultivation. Under the pretext of preventing speculation, the complex lives of citizens are judged by a single yardstick, and those who deviate from it are suspected as potential speculators."

He stated, "The citizens have already experienced the side effects through the Lee Jae-myung administration's real estate policies over the past year. Pushing ahead with regulations based on the principle of actual residency first, exceptions and supplementary measures were tacked on every time it conflicted with reality."

"A similar thing is happening with farmland," he wrote. "The government first pulled out the principle that failing to farm directly equals speculation, but as concerns grew that this does not fit the reality of rural areas, they are now saying they will distinguish inevitable circumstances such as old age, illness, or inheritance."

Mayor Oh criticized, "The government defines someone as a 'speculator' and a 'privileged class' in the name of reform, shouting loud slogans that it will crack down on them. I believe the reason for this lies in the Lee Jae-myung administration's lack of a national governance vision."

He continued, "Without preparing such a vision, this administration seized the opportunity to take power through the martial law situation. As a result, fighting by designating someone as a target to overthrow and liquidate has become the core of state affairs. They wrap this up in the name of reform and corner those who point out side effects as 'privileged classes resisting reform.'"

Mayor Oh stated, "State reform directly tied to the lives and future of the people is on a completely different level from the so-called 'crackdown' style of valley clearance. Please no longer look among the citizens for 'targets to crack down on.' Neither citizens who own homes nor citizens who own land are opponents the president should fight."

He added, "There are separate opponents we must fight: the rapidly changing security environment, the realignment of the global economic order, low growth and low birth rates, crises in industrial competitiveness, and the disappearing opportunities for young people."

(Photo: Yonhap News)

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