hankyoreh

“In a nutshell, this is the worst Cabinet line-up ever,” a lawmaker of the ruling Grand National Party quipped, referring to President Lee Myung-bak’s minister-nominees, three of whom were recently forced to step down amid growing controversy over questionable activities conducted in their personal lives. The Lee administration has said it spent two months choosing the candidates, but the recent resignations have raised the possibility that there may be serious problems with its screening system.

There are several problems with the overall screening system. The Lee administration says it chose the nominees from a pool of around 5,000 candidates. However, it was unaware that some of the nominees had been involved in real estate speculation and other wrongdoings, which should have been spotted in the early screening process. A source close to the Lee administration said, “The selection process has been carried out in a very covert way and the government has failed to implement checks and balances in choosing its personnel.”

Some have pointed out that President Lee’s attitude toward choosing his Cabinet members may also have contributed to the current situation. As Lee and his people seem to be led by a certain kind of pragmatic ideology, ability outweighed moral flaws when they formed the Cabinet. This tendency to put ability first was first revealed when President Lee selected Lee Kyung-sook as the head of his transition team, despite the fact that she had worked for a council that helped a military junta run the nation in the early 1980s. Moreover, the president has chosen his secretaries from the Seoul and Youngnam regions, inciting criticism that he failed to achieve a regional balance in his selection of personnel. Still, Lee’s side has dismissed the criticisms, saying the president has just chosen those who will work closely with him.

A source familiar with the current political situation said, “Lee seems to think that ability should come first, above any moral flaws, as he himself won the election by asking voters to give him a chance to work, despite lingering doubts about his alleged involvement in various forms of wrongdoing.”

A GNP lawmaker said that though the conservative government had taken back power for the first time in 10 years, it “has revealed that it has been more corrupt than previous administrations.”

The current deadlock over the nominations comes as no surprise, as Lee and other GNP lawmakers have to some extent over the past decade demanded tougher moral standards for nominees selected by the two previous liberal administrations.

In addition, Lee did not anticipate the possibility of the GNP opposing his nominations ahead of the National Assembly election in April. One political consultant said, “Lee doesn’t seem to have any kind of strategy for dealing with the current deadlock.” Lee’s administration is taking a wait-and-see stance until the confirmation hearings are concluded, despite the deepening controversy over several of the nominees. It has finally taken action, though belatedly, to replace two of the nominees after the opposition United Democratic Party decided to delay its endorsement of the prime minister-designate.

An official at Chong Wa Dae, or the Blue House, said that some insiders may have urged Lee not to give in to pressure from the opposition party over the formation of the Cabinet. “Things have gotten out of control since there are not many people around Lee with experience and political sense.”

A GNP lawmaker said, “The most serious problem is the way in which they went about selecting the Cabinet members. The concern is that such things could happen again down the road.”


Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]