Exclusive "Conveying Residents' Complaints as Improper Solicitation?" … Are Police Innocent?

Seven Gyeonggi Province provincial lawmakers face fines for allegedly engaging in improper solicitation related to regional festival support projects, sparking legal debate over the extent to which the legislative activities of elected officials in conveying residents' demands to administrative agencies are permitted.

According to the Southern Gyeonggi Police Department on the 13th, the Anti-Corruption and Economic Crime Investigation Division referred seven individuals—four Gyeonggi Tourism Organization employees and three external evaluation committee members—to prosecution on the 22nd of last month on charges of violating the Anti-Graft Act and obstructing duties.

The police also notified the Gyeonggi Provincial Assembly that seven incumbent and former provincial lawmakers who had been members of the Provincial Assembly's Culture, Sports, and Tourism Committee are subject to fines for violating the Anti-Graft Act.

Police determined that the provincial lawmakers requested in March and April of last year that a specific regional festival be selected as a target for the Gyeonggi Tourism Organization's "Small Festival Cultivation Support Project," and that organization employees delivered the festival list to external evaluation committee members, resulting in certain festivals being selected.

However, whether the lawmakers directly contacted evaluation committee members or instructed adjustments to evaluation scores, and what laws or evaluation criteria they demanded be violated, were not specifically confirmed in the published investigation results.

According to reports, the investigation found no evidence that organization employees received direct consideration from the lawmakers or that the lawmakers had special relationships with festival organizers that yielded financial benefits.

■ "Conveying Inquiries from Regional Residents about Call-for-Proposals Projects" … Lawmakers deny involvement in selection

The starting point of the incident, as explained by the provincial lawmakers' side, is complaints from regional residents related to call-for-proposals projects.

Resident autonomous councils or local non-profit organizations that directly apply for projects, unfamiliar with application qualifications, methods, required documents, and evaluation procedures, inquired with regional district lawmakers, who then conveyed this information to Gyeonggi Tourism Organization officials, according to the explanation.

The lawmakers' side explains that the request at the time was not to mandate the selection of a specific festival, but rather to request that sufficient information be provided to residents and organizations wishing to participate in call-for-proposals projects and that relevant procedures be actively guided.

They further contend that they had no personal relationships with external evaluation committee members and made no separate instructions to intervene in the evaluation schedule or process or to change evaluation results.

The provincial lawmakers' side notes that not all festivals they questioned or recommended were selected for support, and questions the investigative determination that linked inquiries about call-for-proposals to actual selection results as a single act of improper solicitation.

They argue that organization employees' compilation of the relevant festival list was simply the consolidation of repeatedly filed complaints in the course of business, and that materials delivered to external evaluation committee members were reference materials for review.

Conversely, police determined that the lawmakers' requests exceeded simple complaint submission or festival recommendations and infringed on other applicants' fair evaluation opportunities.

Ultimately, it is necessary to distinguish and verify the actual content conveyed by the lawmakers, the circumstances under which organization employees conveyed it to external evaluation committee members, and the manner in which evaluation committee members reflected such materials in their assessments.

■ Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission: "Explanation of Regional Priority Projects' Necessity and Conveying Complaints of Public Interest Are Permitted"

A notable aspect regarding the provincial lawmakers' explanation is that the current Anti-Graft Act explicitly permits elected public officials to convey complaints of public interest.

Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 3 of the "Act on the Prohibition of Improper Solicitation and Acceptance of Money and Valuables" provides an exception to the prohibition on improper solicitation when elected public officials convey third parties' grievance complaints or propose and recommend improvements to policies, projects, systems, and their operations for the purpose of public interest.

Official legal interpretations by the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission confirming the applicability of this provision to inquiries regarding regional priority projects are also confirmed.

On November 17, 2016, the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission provided an answer to an "Inquiry on Application of Anti-Graft Act to National Assembly Members," stating that when a National Assembly member explains the necessity of a project to related agencies to promote residents' priority projects in their electoral district, this constitutes conveyance of complaints of public interest and is permitted.

The inquiry concerned whether the action of a National Assembly member in explaining to central government ministries and preliminary feasibility study organizations the necessity of regional social overhead capital (SOC) projects and residents' opinions falls under exceptions to the Anti-Graft Act.

The Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission stated that such action, when constituting public interest grievance complaint conveyance by elected public officials, is permitted under Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 3 of the Anti-Graft Act, and explained that direct conveyance by the member or issuance of public documents under the member's name is also possible.

The scope of public interest purpose was not limited to the interests of the nation or society as a whole.

The Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission interpreted that in addition to the interests of the nation, society in general, and the majority, the interests of specific social groups or all their members may be included in the purpose of public interest.

This legal interpretation demonstrates that the conveyance of opinions by elected public officials regarding priority projects in a specific region is not inherently prohibited.

Accordingly, if necessity of small-scale festivals involving regional residents was conveyed or administrative guidance to assist project participation was requested, there is scope for such activity to constitute legitimate legislative activity depending on its purpose and actual request content.

Inquiries regarding call-for-proposals procedures may also be subject to separate exception provisions.

Article 5, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 4 of the Anti-Graft Act recognizes as an exception the act of requiring public institutions to process duties within statutory time limits or confirming and inquiring about progress and action results.

Subparagraph 6 of the same paragraph also permits acts of requesting explanations or interpretations regarding laws, systems, and procedures related to duties in the form of inquiries or consultations.

If, as the provincial lawmakers' side explains, guidance was requested regarding residents' application methods or call-for-proposals procedures, the applicability of these provisions should also be examined.

Conversely, Article 5, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 8 of the Anti-Graft Act prohibits involvement in supporting subsidies to specific organizations in violation of law, and Subparagraph 12 prohibits requests for evaluations or judgments in violation of law or result manipulation.

Accordingly, the crux of this case lies not in the fact that district lawmakers contacted the organization, but in whether the actual content they conveyed was public interest complaints or inquiries about call-for-proposals procedures, or whether they instead demanded the selection of specific festivals beyond statutory standards.

■ Police also solicit resident opinions and budget securing discussions … inter-agency recommendations are routine administrative activities

Activities that reflect residents' inconveniences and demands to related agencies or request system improvements and budget securing have been conducted within police organizations.

In fact, the Southern Gyeonggi Police Department, which investigated this case, has announced plans to reflect resident opinions in policy and cooperate with local governments on budget securing on multiple occasions.

In February 2022, the Southern Gyeonggi Police Department announced the basic plan for "Traffic Safety and Communication, Ing," stating it would operate reporting channels to collect resident opinions on traffic facilities and regulations and connect police stations' and local government residents' participation systems.

It also designated as key implementation tasks the improvement of safety facilities to protect traffic-vulnerable groups such as children and the elderly and the budget securing necessary for installing unmanned traffic enforcement equipment.

In March of the same year, the department announced a plan to share data analyzing areas where traffic deaths occurred with related agencies and utilize it in expanding traffic safety facilities.

At the time, a Southern Gyeonggi Police Department official explained, "We will push forward consultations with local governments such as cities and counties for traffic safety facility improvements and related budget securing."

The police pursued activities requesting facility improvements and budget support from other administrative agencies for the public interest purpose of resident safety.

Formal systems were also in operation for local police stations to collect residents' opinions and convey them to superior police agencies.

Gangnam-gu, Seoul announced in April 2023 that it would form a public-private-police regional consultative body comprising the Gangnam Police Station, Seoser Police Station, and 22 resident representatives to pursue traffic facility improvements.

According to the plan at the time, after receiving residents' traffic inconvenience complaints, improvements would be prepared through on-site inspections and consultative body discussions, and such requests would be conveyed to the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency through police station reviews.

The approach involved police, local governments, and resident representatives jointly examining the necessity of traffic facility improvements in a specific area and recommending such improvements to relevant agencies.

There are also instances where police agencies have officially stated opinions or requested improvements to government policies.

In June 2022, the National Police Agency expressed concerns about the recommendations of the Administrative Safety Ministry's Police System Improvement Advisory Committee, demanding that the government form a consultative body with participation from on-site police, policy-demand constituents, and experts to collect opinions and discuss police systems overall.

Thus, police have also conducted activities collecting residents' demands, consulting with related agencies, or requesting policy improvements to superior agencies.

Of course, police recommendations for traffic safety facility improvements or policy improvements may differ in character from demands for support in selecting individual call-for-proposals projects. However, in terms of using agency authority to select certain issues among several pending matters and secure budgets for them, the similarity to this case warrants examination.

Particularly given that the Southern Gyeonggi Police Department has used resident opinion collection and inter-agency consultations as a policy implementation method, this investigation also warrants specific explanation of what actions by provincial lawmakers were determined to constitute improper solicitation beyond the scope of routine complaint transmission.

■ The support project itself aims at community harmony and regional commercial activation

It is also necessary to examine the character of the Gyeonggi Tourism Organization's "Small Festival Cultivation Support Project."

This project is a call-for-proposals initiative supporting small-scale festivals organized by non-profit corporations and organizations within Gyeonggi Province for purposes of community harmony and tradition succession, specialized regional resource development, and regional commerce activation.

According to Announcement No. 2025-29 issued by the Gyeonggi Tourism Organization on March 13, 2025, support recipients are non-profit corporations and organizations located in Gyeonggi Province, and support funds can be used for a portion of direct expenses necessary for festival hosting, including production and planning costs, performance fees, stage setup costs, equipment rental fees, promotional expenses, and safety management costs.

Applications are submitted directly by the organizing body via electronic public documents or email. There was also a requirement to provide at least 10 percent self-funding based on the support amount.

Given that the project's purpose itself lies in activating resident-led regional festivals, if residents requested administrative assistance necessary for participation in the call-for-proposals, whether this can be viewed identically to solicitation for private interest requires judgment according to the actual request content.

There are actual cases of resident autonomous councils operating projects.

The Gyeonggi Tourism Organization selected the Suwon Yulcheon-dong Resident Autonomous Council's "Eco-transportation Village - Car-Free Day in Yulcheon-dong" as an excellent case study for the 2023 "Small Festival Cultivation Support Project."

The project started for the first time in 2023 and proceeded to its third call-for-proposals last year.

In 2023, 127 applications were received and 58 festivals were ultimately supported; in 2024, 56 out of 252; and in 2025, 84 out of 319 were finally selected.

On April 7 of last year, the Gyeonggi Tourism Organization expanded the original plan to support approximately 60 festivals to around 80, citing increased applications compared to the previous year and the necessity to discover excellent content.

According to the provincial lawmakers' explanation, some of the festivals they recommended or inquired about during this process were not ultimately selected.

■ Provincial ordinance also specifies provincial lawmakers' participation in festival review

Official grounds for reflecting the local assembly's opinions in regional festival support are confirmed in related ordinances.

Article 7, Paragraph 2, Subparagraph 2 of the "Ordinance on Small Festival Support and Cultivation in Gyeonggi Province" provides that provincial lawmakers recommended by the Gyeonggi Provincial Assembly may be appointed as members of the Small Festival Review Committee.

This provision establishes an institutional channel for local legislators representing residents to have their opinions reflected in formal deliberation procedures.

Additionally, Article 9 of the same ordinance provides that private experts constitute an evaluation panel to evaluate festivals according to evaluation criteria established by the Province.

The structure separately provides for a review committee where lawmakers recommended by the local assembly may participate and a private evaluation panel responsible for professional evaluation.

Of course, the ordinance provision allowing provincial lawmakers to be appointed as official review committee members does not permit individual lawmakers' informal requests for selection.

However, given that the ordinance presupposes local assembly participation in festival reviews, it is necessary to distinguish between the conveying of legislators' policy opinions and improper intervention in the actual selection process.

Particularly, if the fact that lawmakers did not participate in official review bodies and had no contact with external evaluation committee members is accurate, what form organization employees used to convey the lawmakers' requests and how evaluation committee members received them becomes an important matter for examination.

■ Academic research also describes community demand response and regional budget securing as primary representative activities of local lawmakers

The activity of conveying residents' demands to administrative agencies and securing necessary budgets is treated in domestic and international academic research as an important political role for elected representatives.

In "Analysis of the Influence of Political Factors of Local Lawmakers on District Budget Distribution: Focused on the Gyeonggi Provincial Office of Education's Small-Scale Educational Environment Improvement Project Budget," published in the academic journal "Urban Research" Volume 15 by the Incheon Research Institute in 2019, Park Jae-yong described local lawmakers as actors pursuing both the interests of their electoral district and the interests of the broader metropolitan local government simultaneously.

This research analyzing the small-scale educational environment improvement project budget of the 9th Gyeonggi Provincial Assembly found that membership in relevant standing committees and the budget and accounting special committee statistically significantly influenced district-level school support budget distribution.

The research empirically demonstrates that local lawmakers' regional budget securing activities are actual political factors affecting budget distribution, while also suggesting directions for improvement including strengthening distribution criteria and transparency in budget review.

There is also legal research analyzing the relationship between local lawmakers' representative activities and regulations.

In "A Study on Improvements to the Conflict of Interest Prevention System for Local Assembly Members," published in the Korean Journal of Local Government Law, Volume 26, Issue 2 by the Korean Local Autonomy Law Association in 2026, Yang Seung-mi points out structural limitations in uniformly applying conflict of interest regulations designed with individual civil servants' duty performance in mind to local lawmakers.

The research particularly raises issues that the boundary between direct private interest and indirect or reflexive interest is unclear and that the regulatory system for legislative activities performed as members of a representative body of residents may not be sufficiently sophisticated.

This research addresses the conflict of interest prevention system and does not directly determine whether this case violates the Anti-Graft Act. However, it can be viewed as argumentation that elected local lawmakers' democratic representative activities should be distinguished from the ordinary duty performance of administrative civil servants.

Internationally, response to resident complaints has also been treated as an important activity of elected representatives.

Bruce E. Cain, John A. Ferejohn, and Morris P. Fiorina analyzed in their 1987 work "The Personal Vote: Constituency Service and Electoral Independence" the process by which elected representatives form representativeness through direct contact with electoral district residents and the resolution of their complaints.

Alberto Alesina and Guido Tabellini demonstrated in "Bureaucrats or Politicians? Part II: Multiple Policy Tasks," published in the Journal of Public Economics in 2008, the need for a distinction in policy authority between elected politicians and professional bureaucrats.

They explained that in areas where resident preferences are uncertain and policy adjustment is important, elected politicians' roles become significant, while in areas where specific interest influences or short-term political judgments must be controlled, professional bureaucrats' roles become important.

This discussion demonstrates the necessity to distinguish between the role of aggregating and politically adjusting residents' demands and the role of examining and implementing individual projects according to established criteria.

■ Supreme Court distinguishes between exercise of influence and obstruction of duties even with misconduct … judicial standards presented

A point particularly emphasized by the provincial lawmakers' side is that the individual actions of lawmakers must be distinguished from those of Gyeonggi Tourism Organization employees and external evaluation committee members.

Even if lawmakers conveyed residents' requests to organization officials, the manner in which organization employees organized such information, the explanations with which they delivered it to external evaluation committee members, and how evaluation committee members reflected the materials constitute separate factual circumstances.

The provincial lawmakers' side asserts that they had no contact with external evaluation committee members and made no coercive demands for selecting specific organizations nor interfered with evaluation results.

The published police investigation results also do not specifically present whether lawmakers directly contacted evaluation committee members or instructed score manipulation.

Regarding the obstruction of duties charges applied to organization employees and evaluation committee members, there is Supreme Court precedent distinguishing between the existence of wrongful acts and the establishment of obstruction of duties through abuse of authority.

In a decision rendered December 27, 2007 (Case 2005do6404), the Supreme Court examined a case where a local public corporation president improperly intervened in new employee hiring processes.

At that time, the corporation president manipulated a specific applicant's written test score and had application qualification requirements changed so that another applicant could participate in interviews.

However, the Supreme Court determined that the mere fact that employees charged with test duties acted according to the president's wrongful instructions does not establish obstruction of duties through abuse of authority.

Since abuse of authority in obstruction of duties involves causing the other party to fall into misunderstanding, confusion, or ignorance and exploiting such conditions, the employees in question acted in a state of mutual knowledge, conspiracy, or understanding of the wrongful instructions.

The Supreme Court upheld the not guilty determination on obstruction of duties charges, noting that separate targets of misunderstanding or confusion were not confirmed, separate from the fact that wrongful acts occurred.

The Supreme Court also distinguished between actual exercise of influence and the establishment of obstruction of duties through abuse of authority in a decision rendered May 30, 2017 (Case 2016do18858).

That case involved a company executive vice president expressing an opinion to hire a specific applicant in a new employee hiring interview, with remaining interview committee members accepting this view and determining the final candidates to be hired.

The prosecution determined that another interview committee member's fair and objective employee hiring duties were obstructed in this process, having already submitted score sheets and exited the interview, and charged the case accordingly. The first and second trial courts found the obstruction of duties charge guilty.

However, the Supreme Court determined that the interview duties of the committee member who had already submitted score sheets and exited were complete, and that even if the executive vice president exercised influence over other members thereafter, such action could not be said to have caused misunderstanding or confusion in the member who had already exited.

Furthermore, the CEO, who had final hiring authority, was found to have known that interview committee members would deliberate and determine candidates, and to have acquiesced to this.

The Supreme Court found legal error in the original trial's guilty determination of obstruction of duties and remanded the case.

These two precedents involve hiring-related cases with factual circumstances different from this regional festival support project. Additionally, they address abuse of authority as a basis for obstruction of duties rather than determining whether pressure using political position constitutes obstruction of duties through coercion or whether the Anti-Graft Act was violated.

Nevertheless, they present legal principles that the mere fact that specific acts occurred does not mean all obstruction of duties charges are immediately established and that the target and method of obstructed duties, the awareness of the other party, and related factors must be examined in detail.

Accordingly, in this case as well, the lawmakers' requests, the organization employees' list delivery, and the evaluation committee members' selection actions should be separately examined.

Particularly, the manner in which evaluation committee members received the relevant materials, the intent with which they received them, and the actual judgments they made in their reviews are matters requiring confirmation related to obstruction of duties charges. Issues such as abuse of authority, coercion, autonomy, and independence are key points.

■ Fine notification is not final judgment … provincial assembly also concerned about chilling effect on legislative activities

The fine procedure applied to lawmakers in this case is separate from the criminal prosecution procedure applied to organization employees and external evaluation committee members.

Article 23, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 1 of the "Act on the Prohibition of Improper Solicitation and Acceptance of Money and Valuables" provides that a public official who improperly solicits on behalf of a third party may be subject to fines of up to 30 million won.

Article 23, Paragraph 7 requires the head of the employing organization to notify the competent court under the "Non-Contentious Civil Proceedings Act" of the fine subject's violation.

Therefore, the mere fact that police notified the Gyeonggi Provincial Assembly of the fine subjects does not mean fine imposition is final.

The court will examine individual lawmakers' specific actions and relevant materials to determine whether improper solicitation is established and whether fines should be imposed.

The provincial lawmakers' side takes the position that they can contest fine imposition based on legal exception provisions for conveying complaints of public interest and the explanation that they did not interfere with the actual project selection process.

The provincial lawmakers' side also argues that after conducting a lengthy investigation, police categorized the related seven lawmakers for the fine procedure in bulk once determining they were not criminal prosecution subjects.

However, investigation records regarding the circumstances and grounds for the police's fine notification decision have not been confirmed, making it difficult to determine the investigating agency's internal motivation.

Police determined the lawmakers' requests infringed on other applicants' fair evaluation opportunities, while the lawmakers' side counters that their complaint transmission and administrative guidance requests were misinterpreted as improper solicitation.

One lawmaker stated, "The lawmakers conveyed residents' demands without knowing the organization names of festival organizers or businesses participating in the projects, and when organization officials delivered the information to external evaluation committee members, the lawmakers' names were not included," adding "if this is the case, all actions by politicians recommending and requesting agencies to resolve complaints in their electoral districts should be deemed improper solicitation."

Concerns have also emerged within the Gyeonggi Provincial Assembly about the boundary between routine legislative activity and improper solicitation becoming unclear.

A Gyeonggi Provincial Assembly official questioned, "When provincial lawmakers' opinions are compiled and delivered to the Provincial Government, wouldn't those actions also be potentially illegal?" and stated "provincial lawmakers' activities are conducted on behalf of Gyeonggi residents and residents of their districts, and if this is the case, representative democracy itself would be shaken."

Another provincial assembly official noted, "The provincial assembly has not yet proceeded with anything related to this case, such as ethics committee convocation review."