hankyoreh

Media movement members had a full-scale gathering in front of the YTN building on the 100th day of the fight to prevent YTN President Gu Bon-hong from returning to work. A situation statement signed by more than 7,600 journalists was posted in front of the YTN building on Friday evening, and hundreds of former and current journalists and ordinary citizens applied pressure to the company, surrounding the building with large banners listing the names of the signatories.

On Friday morning, the 99th day of the fight to prevent him from returning to work, Gu once again failed to gain entry. Pushing through union members and saying that he had to go to work because it was payday, he was blocked by the labor union and turned around after 15 minutes.

Friday was the chilliest day of the season so far. Union members fought the cold with black scarves and ate rice cakes given to them by citizens who surrounded Gu’s path to work in commemoration of the 100th day of the fight. Choi Jeong-eun, 29, a member of the Internet cafe YTN Jikimi, or YTN Watchdog, provided 200 scarves that were made through financial donations and showed support, saying, “YTN has to stand properly for our words not to be distorted.” Though shivering on the cold ground, the labor union members were in high spirits.

Over the 100 days of the fight to block Gu’s path to work, the YTN union members have become a symbol of struggle, using their entire bodies to block the government's attempts to seize control of broadcasting. Committee chair No Jong-myeon said, “We don’t place any special meaning on the number 100,” but added that the 100-day period has been a time of fighting to protect the common sense view that media companies must be independent from political influence.

The company is also being steadily observed by 33 of the employees subjected to disciplinary actionuse “33 of the employees” if there are more than 33 subjected to disciplinary action; use “33 employees” if there are only 33, one of whom said, “Paradoxically, Gu Bon-hong, the man who disciplined us, is unable to set foot in the company, while we are going in and out freely.”

On October 24, which was also payday at YTN, union members deposited an amount equal to the salary 12 dismissed and suspended workers would have received into their bank accounts through a “Hope Fund” gathered through small donations (totaling more than 52 million won by that morning).

Journalist Woo Jang-gyun, dismissed on October 6, said that even though he had been dismissed, he did not feel that way thanks to his colleagues. “I even feel apologetic when I think about poor working conditions like those at Kiryung Electronics,” Woo said, referring to the over three-year-long strike by irregular workers at that company and adding that he was recalling the forgotten feelings he had when he first became a journalist following the dismissal of reporters who had lapsed into mannerism.

The fight by media movement members to block the seizure of broadcasting is also picking up on the 100th day of the YTN struggle. Former and current members of media groups such as the New Media Forum, the National Union of Media Workers, the Korea Journalists Association and the Korea Producers and Directors Association marched down Namdaemun-ro on the evening of the 24th in Seoul’s Jung district from the Korea Press Center to the YTN building, where they held a “nationwide meeting for the protection of citizen sovereignty and freedom of the press.” They also posted a journalists' situation statement and urged that permission for newspaper companies to also become broadcasters and the introduction of private media representatives be discontinued and that Korea Communications Commission Chairman Choi See-joong, Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Lee Dong-gwan, and Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism Minister Yu In-chon and Vice Minister Shin Jae-min voluntarily tender their resignations.

The media workers’ union plans to support YTN through measures such as a movement to carry YTN stock, the broadcasting of advertisements supporting the YTN union in newspapers and on the radio, and the organization of 100 sponsors for each employee dismissed. The YTN union was awarded a special prize October 24 at the 2008 Ahn Jong-pil Free Press Awards.

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