Support local: Korea’s President Moon Jae-in is buying a Hyundai Casper

The Hyundai Casper is currently the most in-demand car in South Korea, with 18,940 pre-orders collected on the first day Hyundai opened online reservations for the little A-segment SUV.

Aimed at the young, the Hyundai Casper is an instant hit. In keeping with its young theme, the Casper skips the traditional dealer-sold business model, and can only be purchased online. The model will be launched later today 29-September 2021.

Among the 18,940 people who put in their pre-orders is South Korean President Moon Jae-In, and yes it was purchased with his own money.

Also read: Hyundai Casper proves to be popular in Korea, nearly 19k booked on the first day!

This was confirmed by the Blue House, in a written reply to the Korean media.

For President Moon, the purchase is more than just a symbolic gesture to support local products, but a culmination of four years of negotiations with multiple stakeholders to convince Hyundai to build a new plant in the Gwangju region – Korea’s first new car plant in 23 years.

Manufacturing jobs in Korea has been a political hot potato, made worse by tense relations between company management and factory workers' union. As the industry trends towards electrification, many countries are offering attractive incentives for local manufacturing of green cars, but this has also resulted in moving jobs out of Korea.

Also read: 2022 Hyundai Casper unveiled in Korea – Hyundai’s smallest SUV that is inspired by skateboards

The Gwangju plant is unique in that it is not represented by any workers union, and President Moon described it as a 'social compromise' between Gwangju citizens, the local government, labor, and management.

Interestingly, the plant where the Hyundai Casper is made in does not carry the Hyundai Motor Group’s name. Instead, it’s called the Gwangju Global Motors (GGM) plant, as it’s majority owned by the Gwangju local government – 21 percent by the Gwangju Green Car Promotion Agency, 11.3 percent by Gwangju Bank, and 19 percent by Hyundai.

Measuring 3,595 mm long, 1,595 mm wide, 1,575 mm tall, with a 2,400 mm wheelbase, the Casper is about the size of a Perodua Axia Style, except that the Casper is 50 mm taller, thus giving it a more SUV-like stance.

It’s powered by a 1.0-litre three-cylinder turbocharged engine – available either as a naturally aspirated port injection (MPI) or a turbocharged direct injection (T-GDI) variant. Details will be announced later today.

So, when will see our ministers ditching their recond Toyota Alphards for a Proton or a Perodua, bought with their own money?

Also read: Support Malaysian products, so why is the Toyota Alphard our gov's ‘official car’?