Seodaeseok, Mayor of Gwangju Seo-gu, Receives Top Prize in 'Governance Local Politics Awards'

[Asia Economy Honam Reporting Headquarters Reporter Yoon Jamin] Seo Daeseok, Mayor of Seo-gu, Gwangju Metropolitan City, won the Grand Prize in the field of strengthening local autonomy at the ‘2020 Governance Local Politics Awards’.

This award is highly meaningful as it follows last year’s Seo-gu winning the Grand Prize in the ‘Improvement of Residents’ Living Convenience’ category.

According to Seo-gu on the 25th, this contest, organized by the Governance Local Politics Awards Organizing Committee, was held to spread proper local autonomy activities and raise awareness of local politics.

The contest was conducted in five categories: expansion of residents’ living convenience, strengthening local autonomy, community capacity building, and pioneering the future, and was judged based on governance implementation, achievement, innovation impact, creativity and originality, and self-development.

Seo-gu participated in this contest under the theme of ‘Realizing an autonomous community where residents (住) are the main (主) actors centered on autonomy and participation, villages, and the field,’ and won the Grand Prize in the field of strengthening local autonomy.

It was also highly praised for enhancing residents’ democratic participation by holding residents’ general meetings, operating residents’ autonomy councils, and resident participation systems to enable people-centered policies led by residents and supported by the public.

In addition, efforts to build a village where residents solve problems on their own, such as establishing a network centered on village activists to strengthen information exchange, cooperation, and solidarity, were also highly evaluated.

In particular, Seo-gu won the most awards nationwide for two consecutive years (17th and 18th editions) at the National Residents’ Autonomy Expo Best Practices Contest, establishing a nationwide top-level residents’ autonomy model that serves as a role model for cities, counties, and districts across the country.

Seo Daeseok, Mayor of Seo-gu, said, “This award is a valuable prize created through the active activities and participation of residents,” and added, “We will continue to implement various policies where residents become true owners under the district administration goal of ‘People-centered Seo-gu’ together with citizens.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.