The Grand National Party criticized the Millennium Democratic Party presidential candidate Roh Moo-hyun's policy pledge to move the "administrative capital" from Seoul to Daejon as a dangerous idea to lure voters from the Chungcheong area on Tuesday, bringing the issue to the forefront of the election campaign. GNP Spokesman Nam Kyung-pil said if the presidential residence and National Assembly are relocated, the move will not be confined to the "administrative capital," but will in fact be a move of the nation's capital, adding promises that cannot be kept should not be made.

Nam said in a briefing that Roh had told reporters in an October 9 interview that the move will cost W2 trillion, but he had heard that just moving the Jeollanam Provincial Office would cost W 2.5 trillion, and building a new "administrative capital" would cost at least W4 trillion. The GNP spokesman said relocating the capital would be followed by drops in Seoul real estate prices, which would lead to bank insolvencies and therefore it will be a colossal cataclysm for the country and the people.

Suh Chung-won, leader of the GNP also commented in a speech at Incheon that candidate Roh's promise to move the capital would cause a massive relocation problem for people in the Seoul area.

Lim Chae-jung, head of the Millennium Democratic Party Policy Committee held a round table press conference and said the current metropolitan area has serious housing, traffic, and pollution problems, adding that if the problem is not solved, the gap between Seoul and non-Seoul areas will deepen, bringing various social problems that will become a national calamity. Lim continued the construction costs would be no more than W1.6 trillion if a 594,000 square meter large city with 500,000 people was and adding moving expenses the total would be around W6 trillion. He said the money would come from selling the current governmental complex land and the rest of the development could be done by the private sector.

MDP Spokesperson Lee Nak-yon also said that the "administrative capital" should have been relocated earlier.

(Choi Byung-mook, bmchoi@chosun.com )