Plaintiff Wins Appeal in Case of 'No Selection of 4th Priority Negotiation Candidate for Masan Marine New City'

The appellate court ruled that the decision not to select the priority negotiation candidate for the 4th public contest of Masanhangyo New City in Changwon-si, Gyeongnam, must be canceled.

The Changwon 1st Administrative Division of the Busan High Court on the 15th ruled in favor of Company A, the plaintiff, in the appeal trial of the administrative lawsuit filed against Changwon-si regarding the invalidation of the non-selection as the priority negotiation candidate, contrary to the original trial.

The court stated, "The decision by Changwon-si in April 2021 not to select the consortium (alliance) including Company A as the priority negotiation candidate is canceled."

The court also decided to dismiss the appeal regarding the invalidation claim of the non-selection decision and ordered the defendant to bear all litigation costs.

The appeal trial on that day ended without any separate explanation other than the judgment content.

Busan High Court Changwon Branch.
Photo by Lee Seryeong

Earlier, in March 2021, Company A formed a consortium representing itself to participate in the 4th private complex development implementer public contest for Masanhangyo New City but was eliminated.

At that time, Company A's consortium was the only participant in the 4th contest, but it received 794.59 points, which did not exceed 800 points in the selection evaluation of the contest guidelines, and thus was not selected as the priority negotiation candidate.

Company A received notification from Changwon-si in April 2021 that it was not selected as the priority negotiation candidate and filed a lawsuit in May of the same year, claiming issues in the contest review process.

Company A argued that Changwon-si selected three public officials as ex officio review committee members without grounds, and because these three officials gave lower scores than external expert review members, they failed the contest.

The first trial court ruled against the plaintiff, stating, "Changwon-si was granted authority to form the selection review committee under the Enforcement Decree of the Urban Development Act, and it is difficult to view the inclusion of three public officials as ex officio members as unauthorized," and "there is no other basis to recognize the claim that the public officials maliciously gave low scores based on the lottery result for selecting review members."

After the appellate court ruling, a city official said, "We plan to analyze the judgment document and then decide whether to appeal."

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