Government freezes management expense for Heritage of Korean Independence Building

Lee Jong-chan, chairman of the Heritage of Korean Independence, delivers a speech at the National Liberation Day ceremony it hosted at the Kim Koo Museum and Library in Hyochang Park, Yongsan-gu, Seoul, on August 15. Reporter Kwon Do-hyun

It was confirmed on September 8 that the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs froze the management expense for the Heritage of Korean Independence Building at the same scale as the previous year in the 2025 budget. Considering the inflation rate, it is a de facto cut, and the controversy over the budget reduction is expected to continue following the full budget cut of the Heritage of Korean Independence Academy. Opposition parties criticized the government for using its budget to pressure the Heritage of Korean Independence, which demanded the withdrawal of the appointment of Kim Hyung-seok as the director of the Independence Hall of Korea.

According to data submitted by the Ministry of Veterans Affairs, next year's management expense for the Heritage of Korean Independence Building is 3.027 billion won. This is the same scale as in the 2024 budget, which is effectively a budget cut considering the inflation rate. It is a decrease compared to that in the 2023 budget (3.097 billion won).

The ministry initially prepared a budget request of 3.698 billion won for the management expense of the Heritage of Korean Independence Building for next year and submitted it to the Ministry of Economy and Finance, but the adjusted budget after consultation with the Ministry of Economy and Finance was reduced by 671 million won. The management expense for the Heritage of Korean Independence Building is paid by utilizing the National Patriots Project Fund. The fund is financed by the money raised from Korea's property claims against Japan, which is raised by selling the state-owned property of pro-Japanese collaborators.

In response to the question about the reason for the decrease in the 2025 budget compared to that of 2023, the Ministry of Veterans Affairs said, “There is a need to consider the increase of nearby land rents and building management expenses, but it was not reflected in the government's budget process. It did not give a reason why it was not reflected.

Critics point out that the Ministry of Veterans Affairs' budget plan does not fit the basis for calculating the budget it submitted. The ministry wrote the reason for increasing the budget on the basis, but froze the actual budget.

Regarding the land rent paid by the government to the Heritage of Korean Independence, the ministry said that the publicly notified individual land price has increased by 6 percent and the land rent by 11.4 percent over the last five years. It decided to freeze the land rent next year, but did not provide any rationale for freezing the rent in light of the five-year upward trend.

For the cleaning service expense, the ministry said it “applied the average labor cost increase rate of 3 percent surveyed by the KBIZ Korea Federation of SMEs,” and set a budget of 348 million won, down 10 million won from the previous year. The security service expense was also frozen at 102 million won, the same scale as the previous year, with the same rationale.

DPK lawmaker Kim Yong-man pointed out, "From the perspective of the Ministry of Veterans Affairs, it would be necessary to somehow get its hand on the Heritage of Korean Independence. The ministry is holding the purse strings in the Heritage of Korean Independence without foundation but also slashing the land rent it owned.” He added, ”We will normalize the budget through the National Assembly budget review.”

Recently, the Ministry of Veterans Affairs was confirmed to have cut the project cost of 600 million won for the Heritage of Korean Independence Academy, which caused controversy.

The National Assembly's Political Affairs Committee approved the 2023 fiscal year settlement bill on August 28 with the corrective requirement that “the budget of the Heritage of Korean Independence, which was cut in the government proposal, will be restored during the 2025 budget review process."

※This article has undergone review by a professional translator after being translated by an AI translation tool.