Editor’s note: It’s already been 10 years since Kim Jong Un officially assumed leadership in North Korea. For the past decade, he has prioritized improving the people’s lives and developing the economy and focused on constructing all sorts of facilities, including medical, commercial, industrial and residential facilities, promoting these projects widely. Daily NK has recently launched a series called “A Deep Dive into Kim Jong Un’s Legacy Projects,” which looks at the construction process of the facilities referred to over the last decade as Kim’s “legacy projects,” examining how they are run, how North Koreans view them, and what North Korea plans to do with them. The first part of this series looked at the status of the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Zone and can be found here.
Since assuming power, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has promoted his so-called “love of the people,” boasting of efforts to modernize the country’s public healthcare facilities. One of these facilities, the Pyongyang General Hospital, was supposed to be completed within 200 days, but remains unopened even today, three years after the start of its construction.
The hospital’s exterior and interior construction work have been completed, as has work on the outside landscaping, nearby roads and green areas, a reporting partner in Pyongyang told Daily NK recently, speaking on condition of anonymity. Only two companies of engineers with a single construction brigade remain at the site to maintain it, he added.
During his speech at the groundbreaking ceremony for the Pyongyang General Hospital on Mar. 17, 2020, Kim Jong Un essentially admitted his country’s public health system was poor, saying that even North Korea’s capital city was devoid of any “modern medical service facility.”
At the time, North Korea needed to show the world that it could neutralize international sanctions through self-reliance after the breakdown of negotiations with the US. There was also an imperative for Kim to show off his accomplishments at the 75th anniversary of the founding of the Workers’ Party of Korea.
KIM JONG UN’S PET PROJECT
Early in his tenure, Kim had received a propaganda boost for his “love of the people” leadership with the opening of specialized hospitals like Ryugyong Dental Hospital, Ryugyong General Ophthalmic Hospital and Okryu Children’s Hospital. Based on these accomplishments, Kim rushed to open a modern, large-scale general hospital in Pyongyang amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
At the groundbreaking ceremony, Kim also emphasized that the country’s resources needed to be mobilized to complete the hospital “in the shortest period,” noting that the Central Committee had delayed several other construction projects that year with a view to focus on the hospital project.
In fact, Kim himself signed off on many aspects of the hospital project, including its location, design and completion date. Construction personnel previously deployed to the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone and other construction sites were also mobilized to work on the hospital.
“There’s probably no country that can match the construction power of the North Korean military,” Daily NK’s Pyongyang-based reporting partner claimed. “As for erecting the building itself, they finished it according to plan, but they have been unable to bring in and install the medical equipment.”
The only medical devices North Korea can produce domestically are basic things like hospital beds and simple operating tools. In fact, the country relies on imports for all of its medical equipment, but the process of importing this equipment, including their cost, are difficult barriers to surmount, the reporting partner said.
“Despite North Korea’s announcement that it would build a modern general hospital amid the pandemic in early 2020, the country appears to have lacked the financial wherewithal to invest in importing medical equipment as the pandemic dragged on,” Choi Jung-hoon, a senior researcher at Korea University’s Public Policy Research Center and a former doctor in North Korea told Daily NK. “In short, the Pyongyang General Hospital was pushed down the priority list of projects to complete.”
REGIME’S FOCUS HAS SHIFTED TO “SIMPLE” CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS
Another expert told Daily NK that the regime is now focusing on projects like building 50,000 new apartments in Pyongyang, construction of rural housing and greenhouse farms, which are relatively free from issues involving the import of materials or equipment.
“Construction is what North Korea does best and it can complete projects quickly, so after the regime’s failure to open the Pyongyang General Hospital as planned, the Workers’ Party has been placing its priority on [completing] simple construction projects,” a researcher from a South Korean government-affiliated policy think tank told Daily NK, speaking on condition of anonymity.
According to Daily NK’s reporting partner in Pyongyang, North Korean authorities are mulling over when and how to open the Pyongyang General Hospital. They are also discussing a plan to open its doors by properly equipping at least one department in its major ward. As this suggests, it will take time to completely equip and open the entire hospital.
That being said, the Pyongyang General Hospital is the biggest achievement Kim has made in the public healthcare sector since taking power 10 years ago, so the regime believes that it must distinguish the hospital from other medical facilities in Pyongyang, the reporting partner said.
“Given that the Workers’ Party intentionally put the hospital on a site in front of the Workers’ Party Foundation Monument, it must use the hospital – which would boast the highest quality facilities – to prove that its policies are centered on the people. The regime still has nothing to prove this, however.”
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
Daily NK works with a network of reporting partners who live inside North Korea. Their identities remain anonymous due to security concerns. More information about Daily NK’s reporting partner network and information gathering activities can be found on our FAQ page here.
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