In an unexpected move, The Catholic Priests’ Association for Justice has vowed to stamp out corruption at Samsung. Yesterday, the organization revealed that it had obtained information from a former Samsung Group employee, implicating the nation’s leading electronics firm in a series of allegations that it maintains slush funds in the names of its top executives. The revelation sparked the association, which was a key part of the democracy struggles of the 1980s, to launch a new democracy movement aimed at achieving economic justice.

During the era of military dictatorship in South Korea, The Catholic Priests’ Association for Justice was a leading organization in the pro-democracy struggle. The association was also responsible for having made public the truth surrounding Park Jong-chul, a Seoul National University student who, in January 1987, was found to have been tortured to death by police in an incident that ignited the pro-democracy uprising in June, later that year.

At a press conference on October 29, CPAJ expressed its position on the matter of the Samsung slush funds. Father Kim In-guk of the CPAJ said, “We are standing here hoping the nation’s economic democracy will make progress. Our purpose is not just to reveal the wrongdoing committed by a conglomerate but also to provide a starting point for the nation’s economic democratization movement.”

The association continued by saying, “We are staging a second pro-democracy movement, a pro-democracy movement for economic justice, by bringing back the passion (of the June 10, 1987 Civil Uprising).”

This makes it sound as though they believe that, because political democracy has been achieved by degrees, they want to concentrate on achieving economic democracy from now on.

The initial announcement by CPAJ revealed a claim by Kim Yong-cheol, a lawyer who was once the head of the legal team at Samsung Group, that he had discovered several accounts had been opened under his name without his knowledge and “about 1,000” accounts opened under the names of other executives at the conglomerate. While Samsung has confirmed the existence of the account, which contains approximately 5 billion won (US$5.5 million), it has denied that the money belongs to the company.

The association noted that it had wrestled with the idea of whether or not to intervene in the incident. If it disclosed irregularities and structural corruption at Samsung, Kim (the lawyer) would likely face trouble and even a certain amount of danger.

Father Kim said, “CPAJ was in agony when Kim (the lawyer) was making his confession. We were worried about whether we should consider the confession as a personal matter or make it a social issue. We chose the latter.”

As CPAJ considers the incident to be a starting point for the economic democratization movement, the tremors are likely to be felt for a considerable period of time. The association said that it would unite with civic groups to form a pan-national committee and urge Samsung to reform itself. It plans to stage a series of campaigns until it is able to stamp out structural corruption at Samsung in connection with past and present allegations of slush fund creation, illicit stock transactions to Lee Kun-hee’s only son Lee Jae-yong and accounting fraud at Samsung’s affiliates. The association plans to focus on its reform campaign once the next administration is inaugurated in February 2008.

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