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Saenuri Party leader Kim Moo-sung during a charcoal donation activity with foreign exchange students in the Samseong neighborhood of Seoul’s Gwanak district

Saenuri Party leader Kim Moo-sung was seen by several people on Dec. 18 telling a black exchange student carrying charcoal briquettes as part of a volunteer activity that the student’s face “is the same color as that coal.”

The comment toward the African student was made around noon during a “caring coal delivery” service activity organized by the party’s youth committee in the Samseong neighborhood of Seoul’s Gwanak district that day. The student, who is reportedly studying at the Park Chung Hee School of Policy and Saemaul at Yeungnam University, was described by witnesses as having laughed off the remark.

The volunteer event coincided with “Warm Company with the Public: 2015 All-Party Member Volunteer Week,” an occasion organized to mark the third anniversary of the party’s presidential election win 2012 and the year end. Supervised by the Babsang Community Welfare Foundation’s Seoul Coal Bank, the activity involved volunteers delivering coal to basic livelihood benefits recipients, elderly people living alone, low-income family businesses, and households where children are being raised by grandparents.

Kim later posted an apology on Facebook following reports of his remarks on online media.

“It was a wrong remark due to lack of consideration of how something I had intended to be friendly might be hurtful. The situation was a conversation together during a pleasant atmosphere while volunteering, but I did not think enough about the other person’s perspective,” Kim wrote.

Kim went on to say there was “no excuse for my carelessness” and offer his “deepest heartfelt apologies.”

By Kim Won-cheol, staff reporter

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