Taxpayers' money misappropriated

[Anchor]

Local councils that improperly used national public activity budgets, including operational expenses and travel expenses, have been caught in large numbers.

Among the 28 councils under investigation, problematic cases were found in 27, with only one council being exempt.

The amount identified as improperly used exceeds 2.5 billion won.

Reporter Hyun Ye-seul has the details.

[Report]

The Suwon City Council in Gyeonggi Province held 'legislative training' every year in the first and second halves from 2022 for two years.

Each time, they ordered uniforms for the city council members, spending 60 million won in tax money for two years' worth of uniforms.

The Suwon City Council has 37 members.

If all of them participated, it means that 1.62 million won was spent per council member.

Members of the Gyeonggi Provincial Council purchased padded jackets from a hiking brand costing 249,000 won each.

This expenditure was revealed during an investigation by the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission into the activity expenses used by the bottom 28 local councils in terms of integrity from August 2022 over a period of 18 months.

Including these disposable uniforms, the total amount identified as improperly used by the Commission is 2.53 billion won.

Of this, 84%, or over 2.13 billion won, was for 'meal expenses.'

There were cases where participants or the purpose of use were not properly documented, or where expenses were incurred on weekends without justifiable reasons.

Tax money was also used for personal marathon participation fees for council members in Gunsan, Jeollabuk-do, and for 'walking competition' expenses for council members in Wonju, Gangwon-do.

Problematic cases were revealed in 27 out of the 28 councils under investigation, with only one council being exempt.

[Lee Myung-soon/Vice Chair of the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission: "Local councils have been criticized for their relatively low integrity and the repeated occurrence of improper budget execution, which still falls short of the public's expectations."]

The Commission plans to notify the institutions of the violations and demand disciplinary action against those involved and the recovery of the budget.

This is KBS News reporter Hyun Ye-seul.