New Chungju mayor embraces city's viral promotion playbook, in costume

The new mayor of Chungju, North Chungcheong Province, is trying to carry forward the city’s unconventional social media legacy, built under his predecessor, by dressing up, dancing and lip-syncing in an 18-second promotional video.

In a video titled “I Love Chungju Fancam (Moving Stone Version),” posted Friday to his YouTube channel, Lee Dong-seok, wearing a long wig and scarf, makes a heart gesture, dances and lip-syncs to “I Like You,” a song by fictional ballad singer Choi Sung-gon from the movie “Wild Sing.” The video ends with a close-up of a sign reading “I love Chungju.”

It is the third such video by Lee, 40, who was elected mayor on June 3 to lead a city with an unusually large social media following.

Chungju’s official YouTube channel has around 830,000 subscribers, an extraordinary audience for a rural city better known for its apples. Much of that following was built by Kim Seon-tae, a city official better known as “Chungju Man,” who worked under Lee’s predecessor and left his city government post before the June election.

Lee’s videos echo those of Kim, whose low-budget, quirky clips raised Chungju’s profile with younger audiences.

In previous videos, the new mayor danced to Ateez’s “Bad” to promote Chungju peaches and laid on a table to promote the city’s sweet potatoes.

"To erase your predecessor's legacy, just be crazier than them," one user commented on the video.

Another commented, "This is not a mayor. This is a man who became a mayor to be a comedian."

At his inauguration, Lee unveiled that his goals included enriching the city through nurturing future industries and building a solid foundation to attract more young people to visit and live in Chungju.