79 Percent of High Ranking Official Accumulated Their Properties

573 high ranking officials out of 724 first class officials in the administration, jurisdiction, and the Constitutional Court, who are obliged to register their properties were turned out to have gained properties and 90 officials among them accumulated over 100 million won.

The Government Officials Ethics Committee released such data that analyzes the changes of the properties of high-ranking officials through the official newsletter on 28th. The National Assembly will release the property changes of lawmakers today.

The analysis showed that the increase rate increased by 9 percent compared to the 70 percent of 2000 and the number of the officials who accumulated over 100 million won last year was 34 more than 56, the number of officials in 2000. 146 high-ranking officials suffered from the loss of their properties and 5 officials had no change of their properties.

Administration: 468 officials (78.8 percent) out of 594 registered officials had accumulated their properties last year. The number of government officials who lost their properties decreased to 122 (20.5 percent), which is much less than the number of last year, 188. And 4 officials reported no change in their properties.

President Kim Dae-Jung reported that he gained 30 million won from his salary and interests but his property had reduced by 1 billion 683.68 million won because he donated 1,102,220,000 won of his Nobel prize money to the Kim Dae-Jung Peace Foundation for Asian Pacific Region. Prime Minister reported the increased savings of 2.55 million won.

Gu Cheon-Seo, Chief Director of Human Resources Development Services of Korea, ranked at the top by the increase of 2,530,780,000 won from the increased stocks and the profits. 14 out of 15 government officials who reported their properties have accumulated their properties.

Jurisdiction and the Constitutional Court: 92 out of 116 chief judges in the High Courts and above made their fortunes last year but 23 had lost part of their properties and 1 judge has no change.

Judges who made a fortune over 100 million won are 13 including chief judge Lee Young-Ae in Seoul High Court but 4 judges including judge Lee Sang-Hoon (Daejeon High Court) suffered from the loss over 100 million won last year.

All 13 high officials including judges and officials in the Constitutional Court except for Seo Sang-Hong (vice secretary general) enjoyed the increase of their properties.

Soo-Hyung Lee sooh@donga.com · Hyun-Doo Lee ruchi@donga.com