hankyoreh

The salvaged Sewol ferry sits at a port in Mokpo, South Jeolla Province, on April 13, 2023, days ahead of the ninth anniversary of its sinking, which killed over 300 people, most of whom were high school students on a field trip. (Yonhap)

A documentary about the tragic sinking of the Sewol ferry that KBS had been planning to air for the disaster’s 10th anniversary has been canceled. 

According to statements from KBS staffers gathered on Tuesday, personnel that had been working on the documentary were ordered to delay its release by KBS executives, for fear of the documentary “influencing the general election.” 

On the same day, the documentary production crew posted a message to a group of KBS producers. The message said, “KBS executive Lee Je-won ordered the Sewol documentary production crew to release it as part of a larger series on disasters sometime after June.” The message added, “The production crew protested the unjust order and requested a reversal of the decision, but on Feb. 15, we received a message that an April release of the documentary was out of the question.”  

The aforementioned executive used the upcoming general election in April as a reason to delay the documentary’s airing. The documentary had originally been planned to be aired on April 18, two days after the tragedy’s 10-year anniversary. This prompted questions from the production crew about how the documentary could influence the general election, which is scheduled for April 10. 

According to the crew, Lee responded that “any timeframe that falls within a month before or after the election has the potential to influence.” The crew said that the documentary is around 40 percent complete in terms of shooting and 80 percent complete in terms of interviews and scheduling. 

Lee Je-won was appointed as the director of public broadcaster’s Content Production 1 division on Jan. 27. This was a little more than a month after he was appointed to direct the KBS branch at Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, on Dec. 8, calling the appointment into question. 

Lee stirred controversy in the past when he posted something on his Facebook page that alleged that the bloodily suppressed democratization movement on May 18, 1980, in Gwangju was orchestrated by the North Korean military. Lee reportedly learned of the Sewol documentary’s production a week after his appointment. According to the production crew, Lee convened a meeting of other KBS executives on Feb. 3 and ordered that the documentary’s airing be pushed back. 

“If we release the footage as part of a larger series on disasters, then it becomes something entirely different,” the production crew asserted. 

“Now we have to explain this to the Sewol survivors and everybody who has helped us for over two months. We can only imagine how they’ll take the news. How will they look at us when we tell them, ‘We can’t air this footage because the upper heads have determined it will influence an election that will already be over when we’re supposed to go live’?”

The KBS chapter of the National Union of Media Workers is currently investigating the matter. 

In response to the Hankyoreh’s request for a comment on the documentary, KBS replied, “We’re looking into the matter to see what exactly happened within the Content Production 1 division.” 

By Park Kang-su, staff reporter

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