Political Banners Proliferate Across Suwon, Marring Urban Landscape

[News S=Reporter Jung Jun-seong] Political banners are proliferating at prime locations such as intersections throughout Suwon, damaging the urban landscape.

In particular, these political banners have intensified around the Lunar New Year holiday period, becoming eyesores and adding to pedestrian inconvenience.

This is mainly because they are indiscriminately posted between street trees, between streetlights and traffic signals at busy intersections with heavy foot traffic.

Most of the proliferating political banners belong to politicians from various parties seeking to raise their profiles ahead of next year's general election.

In addition, prospective candidates for agricultural cooperative chairman elections scheduled for March, as well as mayors and local council members, are also posting them indiscriminately.

The messages vary widely, ranging from party promotion and government criticism to self-laudatory policy promotion, disparagement of opponents, and Lunar New Year greetings. This further aggravates the frustration of citizens experiencing walking inconveniences.

However, there is no way to remove these banners, which has become a bigger problem and encourages their proliferation.

The enforcement ordinance for monitoring political banners was revised on December 10 last year.

Under the current Outdoor Advertising Act and its enforcement ordinance, banners can be posted anywhere at any time if certain conditions are met.

As a result, banners posted at locations other than designated posting areas are exempt from illegal outdoor advertising removal.

As long as the party name, party contact information and installer contact details, and posting period are displayed, enforcement is waived.

Therefore, local governments managing outdoor advertisements have no way to enforce removal if the legally permitted 15-day posting period has not expired.

Citizens expressed anger, saying "while general banners face strong crackdowns including forced removal, political banners are given a free pass—this is favoritism." They added that "laws tailored to politicians' preferences must be corrected as they violate principles of fairness and equity."