Suspicion of Speculation in Yongin Semiconductor Cluster, Is the Truth Emerging?

Residents' Committee: "About 200 Cases of Speculation Including 30 LH Employees, City Officials, and Project Company Staff"
Blueprints Circulated 3 Years Before Project Plan Review... Residents Claim "Officials and Company Staff Bought Land"
City Refers 3 of 6 Land-Acquiring Officials Suspected of Speculation to Police for Investigation

Yongin Semiconductor Cluster. Yonhap News

[Asia Economy Reporter Eunmo Koo] As suspicions of land speculation by employees of Korea Land and Housing Corporation (LH) are expanding into investigations of suspicious land transactions in nationwide planned development areas, the long-rumored speculation allegations regarding the semiconductor cluster general industrial complex in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province have surfaced. In particular, there are allegations from residents that LH employees also made speculative purchases in the semiconductor cluster, and that city hall officials and project company employees were heavily involved in speculation, making an investigation to uncover the truth inevitable.

The Yongin Semiconductor Cluster is a project to establish a next-generation memory production base on 4.16 million square meters in Wonsam-myeon, Cheoin-gu, with a project cost of 1.79 trillion KRW. Since the second half of 2018, when SK Hynix was reported to invest about 122 trillion KRW here, land prices surged by 30-40% amid expectations of a 'real estate jackpot,' and so-called 'tteotdabang' (speculative real estate offices) also appeared.

Subsequently, on March 29, 2019, Wonsam-myeon was confirmed as the project site and a public notice for residents was issued. However, maps containing the boundaries and land use plans of the planned project site had been circulating in the market for three years prior, raising suspicions of speculation using this information. The real estate industry in Cheoin-gu had possessed anticipated maps since 2016, which matched the maps disclosed by Yongin City at the time of the public notice, strongly suggesting prior information leakage, but no fact-finding investigation has been conducted to date.

Among residents within the project site, it was openly rumored that Yongin City officials and SK Hynix employees purchased land under borrowed names. Yongin City has maintained the position that "if the maps created by SK during project promotion were leaked, they were leaked, but the city did not leak the maps."

The semiconductor cluster speculation allegations, which had been quietly buried, reached a turning point recently with the emergence of land speculation allegations involving LH employees in the 3rd New Town development. On the 7th, Yongin City announced it would block speculative forces in local project districts such as the semiconductor cluster and Platform City, and through a press release stated that its internal investigation confirmed no employees owned land within the project districts.

However, on the 18th, Yongin Mayor Baek Gun-gi held an emergency online briefing and revealed that a full survey of 4,817 employees of city hall and Yongin Urban Corporation found that six had acquired land related to the project site, and three of them with suspicious speculative circumstances would be referred to the police for investigation. This was a reversal from the previous claim that no land-owning officials existed to acknowledging six transactions within ten days. Moreover, the officials suspected of speculation were identified by matching public officials' names with land transaction records, raising suspicions that there are many more cases involving family members or borrowed names.

Residents of Wonsam-myeon, who have raised speculation allegations, are opposing the city’s decision to refer only three officials for investigation, calling it a typical 'scapegoating.' They argue that the city’s internal investigation cannot be trusted and that changing the scope and methods of investigation could uncover many more speculators.

The Wonsam-myeon Residents’ Integrated Countermeasure Committee held a press conference in front of city hall that afternoon, stating, "We conducted an internal investigation of land transaction records within a 1 km radius from the boundary of the expropriated land and secured about 200 suspicious cases of speculation," and urged, "Since the contents of Yongin City’s internal investigation cannot be trusted at all, police and other investigative agencies should take charge of the investigation."

Among the 200 cases, 30 are suspected to involve LH employees’ transactions, and another 20 are suspected to involve city hall officials and project company employees. In particular, the 30 transactions were made on forest land in Dokseong-ri (about 3,000㎡), Jukneung-ri (about 5,000㎡), and Saam-ri (about 20,000㎡) in Wonsam-myeon, within a 2 km radius outside the boundary of the land to be expropriated, mostly under joint ownership by two or more people. The committee stated that due to the Personal Information Protection Act, they cannot disclose the names of these individuals but will provide all investigation materials if requested by investigative agencies.

Meanwhile, Yongin City plans to conduct a second round of real estate speculation investigations targeting 358 employees with work history in the project department, about 2,800 spouses, direct relatives, siblings, and employees and families suspected of speculation based on reports.

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