hankyoreh

former Korea Communications Commission chairman

By Ahn Chang-hyun, staff writer

It’s one problem after another for the Blue House.

With prosecutors currently investigating former staff members over involvement in illegal surveillance of civilians, the Blue House (Cheong Wa Dae, South Korea’s presidential office and residence) is now reeling from explosive remarks by former Korea Communications Commission chairman Choi See-joong on Lee Myung-bak’s presidential election fund.

Blue House spokesman Park Jung-ha had no comment on the allegations Tuesday, noting that the prosecutors’ investigation is still ongoing. Despite the calm exterior, things are quite different on the inside.

A key Blue House official said simply, “We took a beating and we thought we had just managed to move on, and now we’re getting hit with a second tide.”

The shock may have been especially severe for the Blue House because Choi is closer than anyone to President Lee Myung-bak. As a member of the so-called “Council of Six” who managed Lee‘s election team, he ranked alongside Lee Sang-deuk, a New Frontier Party lawmaker and the President’s older brother, as one of the top two contributors to the administration‘s launch.

Making the situation even more troubling for the Blue House is the nature of his remarks, in which he said the election camp spent billions of won received from a real estate developer for Pi-City, a large-scale retail and distribution complex project in Seoul’s Yangjae neighborhood, on opinion polling. Depending on how the situation plays out, its effects could reach over to the entire election fund and deal a devastating blow to the administration’s moral reputation.

Speaking at a Sept. 2011 meeting at the Blue House, President Lee said, “We need to consider the fact that this administration came into being through an election where it did not take any money. We are an ethically perfect administration, and we must not leave even the slightest blemish”.

The notion of coming to power without taking money was the foundation of Lee’s pride, but that foundation is now disintegrating.

When the surveillance issue broke out ahead of the general election, the Blue House succeeded in deflecting criticism by alleging that 80% of the monitoring took place under the preceding Roh Moo-hyun administration. This time, however, no such escape route is available.

Its fate now lies in the hands of the prosecutors, and at the end of a presidential term, when their knives are typically out. If the investigation does get closer to the “true nature” of Lee’s election fund through Choi, the President may end up not just as a “lame duck” but as a veritable “political vegetable.”

In 2004, the central investigations division of the Supreme Public Prosecutors’ Office examined the election funds of both candidates, Roh and Lee Hoi-chang, and found that the Grand National Party had received billions on won through “money trunks.”

“The Blue House has no way of controlling the prosecutors now,” another key Blue House official said, hinting at the anxiety there. “We have no idea what might pop up in the future.”

The Democratic United Party (DUP), which has taken to calling the situation the “Choi See-joong illegal election fund scandal,” urged the prosecutors to leave no stone unturned in their investigation.

Speaking at a briefing, party spokesman Park Yong-jin said, “The root of this case is not improprieties in the solicitation of permits and approval, but an illegal presidential election campaign fund. We hope the Blue House moves quickly to reveal all the details in this case before the people of South Korea”.

Park also said the party would respond sternly to the scandal as a “serious case where the administration’s fate hangs in the balance after the illegal civilian surveillance situation.”

DUP floor leader Kim Jin-pyo said at a party supreme council meeting Monday that “the ones bearing responsibility for curtailing press freedoms and regression of democracy in the Republic of Korea and are Choi See-joong, the ’President‘s mentor,’ and Park Young-joon, the ‘king’s man.‘”

“If the prosecutors try to cut this investigation off before it moves up the line, it will be like cutting the tail off an animal. It will just be added to the list of parliamentary audits and hearings to be held by the 19th National Assembly,” Kim continued.

“And it will only contribute further to the popular consensus that prosecutorial reforms are urgently needed,” he added.

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