hankyoreh

After a prolonged standoff with the Presidential Security Service (PSS), the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials aborted an effort to arrest the suspected ringleader of the Dec. 3 insurrection attempt on Friday.
 
The PSS, stooping to serve as the president’s personal bodyguards, blocked a state agency from rightful enforcement of the law. The worry that the PSS could, at any given time, operate as footmen to people with power, has become a reality.  
 
Until the Second Republic of Korea, the responsibility of guarding and protecting the president rested on the shoulders of the police.
 
The Kyungmudae — currently known as the Blue House — fell under the jurisdiction of the Changdeok Palace police station, so the Changdeok police were left in charge of protecting the president. Establishing a police station for the Blue House ensured that the president’s security was left entirely to those working in that branch.
 
The PSS as we currently know it harkens back to Park Chung-hee’s dictatorship. The Supreme Council for National Reconstruction’s security service, formed after Park’s May 16, 1961, coup, became known as the “Office of Presidential Security” after Park’s inauguration as president.
 
The service has gone by different names under different administrations, but the underlying framework of the group as one of the organizations closest to the president, and whose head is appointed personally by the president, has remained the same.
 
Since its inception there have been concerns raised about abuse of power with regard to the service, especially as the service enjoyed the backing of the most powerful person in the nation. With no organization to keep it in check, the PSS is liable to act on the private and political whims of those in authority. Cha Ji-jeol and Jang Se-dong, the heads of the service under Park Chung-hee and Chun Doo-hwan, respectively, were able to act as the government underbosses thanks to their presidents’ backing.  

Under Yoon, the behavior of Kim Yong-hyun’s PSS echoed that of the service under Cha Ji-cheol. A proposed amendment to the enforcement decree of the Presidential Security Act that was made public in November 2022 included stipulations that would allow the PSS to supervise and command military and police forces performing security duties — a carbon copy of the sort of moves made during the Yushin regime of Park. After facing scrutiny, language about “supervision and command” was replaced with “negotiated with the chiefs of the respective agencies,” before being passed by the Cabinet. 

Then, in October 2023, there was yet another attempt to amend a law to give the chief of the PSS the authority to perform background checks, but that too fell apart. The government’s budget allocation of 139.1 billion won for the PSS in 2025 — a 43.4% surge from their budget of 97 billion won in 2022 — also became fodder for continued controversy over attempts to bulk up the service. 

When the PSS acted in an extralegal manner to jump in front of a bullet to protect a suspect of insurrection, it illustrated the sad reality that the service has become corrupted into the private foot soldiers of the president. Most advanced nations have two to three levels of checks on executive security agencies. The US Secret Service operates under the Department of Homeland Security, while countries like the UK, Japan and Canada that use parliamentary systems entrust the security of leaders to organizations that operate within their respective police agencies. It’s high time that we in Korea discuss what a security agency befitting our level of democracy looks like. 

By Choi Hye-jeong, editorial writer

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