INCHEON — Incheon Metropolitan City Development Corporation (iH), which has been stuck in the fourth tier — near the bottom — for three consecutive years in the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission's integrity assessment, is staking everything on tightening official discipline and lifting its integrity score ahead of the Chuseok holiday.
The corporation held an "integrity practice campaign" on the 21st to tighten official discipline and sent letters on integrity to related organizations and external clients.
President Ryu Yoon-ki, along with the audit office and the labor union, took part in the event and resolved to put integrity into practice, including a pledge neither to give nor receive holiday gifts. The aim is to tighten discipline during a holiday period when standards easily slip, through measures such as refusing to give or receive holiday gifts, banning the acceptance of money or entertainment, and eradicating drunk driving.
The move goes beyond a routine annual campaign, reflecting a sense of urgency about escaping the chronic stigma of ranking near the bottom in integrity. Incheon Metropolitan City Development Corporation has remained in the fourth tier for three straight years in the commission's comprehensive integrity assessment of public institutions. Given that few institutions receive the lowest fifth tier in evaluations of state-owned enterprises, the result amounts to a bottom-rung report card.
The corporation points to the structural characteristics of its land compensation and public rental housing operations, which stem from large-scale development projects, as the reason behind its low integrity score. Because the share of its work devoted to land compensation, where financial interests clash sharply, and to rental housing management, where complaints over move-ins and defects are concentrated, is overwhelmingly higher than at other institutions, the corporation says it has repeatedly lost points in the external client survey that forms the core of the commission's assessment. Despite efforts to improve its systems, the nature of the work has been a major source of deductions, according to the analysis.
Accordingly, Incheon Metropolitan City Development Corporation is running high-intensity anti-corruption measures this year under President Ryu. Since the first half of the year, it has reviewed integrity practice tasks by department and has been intensively shoring up weak points, including improving convenience and access to information for land compensation and rental housing clients.
"With the head of the organization leading the way, we have pushed internal awareness improvement and on-site communication far more intensively than in previous years," said Shin Tae-kyung, head of iH's integrity team. "We expect our rating will definitely be raised in this year's commission assessment."
"Integrity is a basic value of public enterprise management that cannot be compromised," President Ryu said. "Through painstaking efforts to establish official discipline, we will be reborn as a public enterprise trusted by citizens."
