[Reporter`s View] New Year`s briefing needs substance

Each agency of the government is alerted at the beginning of each year to brief the president on its business programs because the president makes the initial evaluation of the previous year¡¯s performance and the New Year¡¯s policy programs.

The president¡¯s evaluation affects the personnel management or Cabinet organization that used to be conducted at the beginning of each year. It is no wonder that the ministers become tense at this time of year.

Nonetheless, there still are many questions on whether the business reports by each ministry had functioned as the integrated and substantial tool for evaluation. Under the previous authoritarian governments, the briefing sessions tended to become outwardly noisy events just for show.

In the previous days, the briefing session started with the president¡¯s hearing the report and ended with the president¡¯s prepared questions and his general comment. So each ministry had only to prepare answers for the expected questions well for a good briefing session with no problems.

In order to correct these problems, the government had civilian experts attend the session of the year that started at the Ministry of Finance and Economy (MOFE) on Monday. The president¡¯s questions also were not provided in advance to the ministries.

As a result, the briefing session at the MOFE showed a quite different look from the past ones, as the civilian experts and government officials engaged in an impromptu debate on reform programs and prospects for the U.S. economy this year, the presidential office said.

However, there was no substantial discussion this time. The briefing and discussion lasted about two hours in the presence of five civilian experts, but only three of them had a chance to speak. And they were allowed to speak only when the president asked them about specific issues.

I came to think that there must be more supplementary measures if the new format of the briefing session for President Kim Dae-Jung could obtain the desired outcomes. For instance, the government might consider asking the civilian experts who have no chance to speak to submit written evaluations of the session. Maybe ministers of the concerned agencies will become more tense and humble.

Of course, the New Year¡¯s briefing session should be changed into a standing event to listen to substantial reports and to supervise the ministries throughout the year.

Yun Seung-Mo ysmo@donga.com