hankyoreh

Moon Chang-keuk’s nomination as Prime Minister is turning into prime-time melodrama. Some resolution had been expected when President Park Geun-hye returned from her Central Asia trip on June 21, but the weekend passed without any new developments. At this point, there’s really no argument about Moon’s unsuitability. Yet nominator and nominee alike have spent the past few days fighting a laughable battle of wills. When the issue and its solution are so obvious, one can only blame the Blue House’s incompetence and cowardice.

Moon has made it clear over the past few days that he has no intention of pulling out of the running. He has come out saying the fate of his nomination is a “matter for President Park to decide.” However one feels about his attitude, it is absolutely right that the President has the authority as nominator to withdraw his name from consideration if she deems him unfit to serve as Prime Minister. After all, who’s going to trust a gesture of voluntary withdrawal at this point? To try to put pressure on Moon to withdraw by deferring her approval of the nomination vote’s submission to the National Assembly is just a petty tactic. The President is the one who nominated him, and now she is inviting her critics to accuse her of dodging responsibility for the vetting and nomination failure. The inability to get other things done while this mess is sorted out is totally attributable to President Park and her own irresponsibility.

Her next step should be to withdraw the nomination and apologize for the mistake. She should also reconsider her other Cabinet picks, since Moon’s vetting and nomination failure was far from the only one. Afterwards, she should spend some time thinking about why these fiascos keep happening and who bears the blame.

At this point, it is the Blue House that urgently needs a serious overhaul. The reason we’ve seen one nomination disaster after another is because of Park’s insular and opaque approach. Under past administrations, nominees were selected by a public organization from a past database of names. Since Park took office, the public has had no way of knowing who selected these candidates or what the process was. It’s a system where the decision for most major posts is made on the discretion of one person, the President. Under the circumstances, these kinds of vetting problems were a foregone conclusion. There are also reports that the Blue House personnel committee found evidence of plagiarism among several candidates in the latest Cabinet reshuffle, but was unable to override the President’s own imprimatur. It’s a comprehensive breakdown of the Blue House screening system.

Chief of Staff Kim Ki-choon is head of that Blue House personnel committee, and it’s clear he bears some blame for things reaching this point. The Blue House should waste no time overhauling its personnel system and setting up a new personnel committee outside. Meanwhile, all these attempts to avoid responsibility are only going to make things worse.

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