[Editorial] Will Deny Until Presidential Election?

The allegation that our government bought the North-South summit for $400 billion has been spawning allegation after allegation. Even officials of Industrial Bank and Hyundai Merchant Marine, Inc. made explanations, the public does not know whose story to believe. We suspect that the side, which will be damaged when the truth is disclosed, intends to keep waging a “denying game,” without any cooperation, until the Dec. presidential election is over.

It is not difficult to dig out the truth if they look into the books of the companies involved, since the transaction was between two corporations and the amount of the transaction reached up to $400 million. Nonetheless, rather than finding out the truth, new allegations are emerging day after day. All of these come from the lack of the will on the part of the government to discover the truth. It is not because the government has no agency to deal with it and, thus, cannot conduct a probe into it.

If the government has any will at all to resolve the matters arising out of the allegations, it should immediately launch an investigation of Industrial Bank and Hyundai. If people involved admits to their wrongdoing, the matter will not be so difficult to be answered. But each of them is talking about a different story. Then, isn’t it necessary to make efforts to see who is talking the truth?

Even regarding the whereabouts of the 400 million, the two main actors in this “motion picture” are contradicting each other. It’s unbelievable! Hyundai alleges that it just withdrew one quarter of the amount, while the bank contends that Hyundai withdrew the whole amount over only one occasion. Listening to them, we get to believe that either of them is lying or has intentionally manipulated its accounting records.

But there is one thing either should know for sure: the more delayed, the more devastating the impact will be when the truth comes out. If they did nothing wrong, what is the point in hiding banking and accounting records? If they just intend to hide the things that do not sound favorable to them, it will only wreak more havoc on them and complicate the matter.

Also, if the government keeps closing its eyes on the request for truth of the allegation, that will backfire on them. Some might consider that behavior as the government’s admission of the wrongdoing, which it is trying to distance itself from. Without getting to the bottom of this matter, any further talks with North mean nothing. Rather, it is an unfortunate incident in terms of the national interest. The severer the political war between parties regarding the allegation about $400 million won, the farther the public’s support will drift away for improvement of North-South relations.