"Where Was It Spent" Rather Than "How Much Was Received"... Jeju Special Self-Governing Provincial Council Prepares to Verify 2025 Settlement

[Financial News Jeju = Reporter Jeong Yong-bok] The Jeju Special Self-Governing Provincial Council has called in financial experts to strengthen its verification capabilities ahead of the settlement review to determine whether Jeju Island's finances for the 2025 fiscal year were executed as originally planned.
According to the Jeju Special Self-Governing Provincial Council on the 3rd, the Council's Special Committee on Budget and Accounts invited Son Jong-pil, director of The Center for Fiscal Reform, to give a special lecture in preparation for the review of the 2025 fiscal year settlement at the main conference room of the Council Members' Hall the previous day. Members of the Special Committee on Budget and Accounts and staff from the Council Secretariat attended the lecture.
Son Jong-pil explained the major issues arising during the operation of local finances and the key points to check during settlement reviews. Going beyond a general explanation of the financial system, he analyzed the situation based on actual cases using Jeju Island's 2025 fiscal year settlement report.
Settlement of accounts is a procedure to verify retrospectively where and how much of the budget allocated for the year was actually spent. While the budget review examines plans for future spending, the settlement review is a process of verifying execution results and policy outcomes.
The scope of scrutiny by the Provincial Council is not limited solely to the execution rate. Only by comprehensively evaluating unspent funds exceeding the plan, projects carried over to the next year, the appropriateness of reserve fund usage, the management of various funds, and performance by project can issues in financial management be reflected in the next budget.
In particular, during this regular session, the settlements of accounts for the 2025 fiscal year of Jeju Island and the Jeju Provincial Office of Education will be reviewed one after another.
The Special Committee on Budget and Accounts of the Jeju Special Self-Governing Provincial Council plans to deliberate on and vote on Jeju Island's 2025 fiscal year settlement, reserve fund expenditures, and fund management settlement on the 16th and 17th. The settlement of the Jeju Provincial Office of Education and the fund settlement will be deliberated separately on the 21st.
The structure is such that each standing committee first examines the execution details of each relevant department, after which the Special Committee on Budget and Accounts comprehensively verifies the overall finances.
This expert lecture was also focused on enhancing review expertise so that members could examine the connection between project objectives, actual implementation results, and outcomes resulting from financial investment.
Kim Bong-hyun, chairman of the Special Committee on Budget and Accounts of the Jeju Special Self-Governing Provincial Council, said, "Through this lecture, we will enhance the financial expertise of the council members to ensure that a substantive settlement review is conducted that meets the expectations of Jeju residents."


[email protected] Jeong Yong-bok Reporter