Publicizing Possessions Of Presidential Relatives, The Opposition Promotes Legal Systematization

Grand National Party (GNP) is promoting legal measures to make it mandatory for presidential relatives to publicize their possessions and also to limit their employment in public offices, in order to eradicate high authority- related corruption.

During its recent conference, GNP’s National Reform Committee (NRC) has arranged eradication measures of presidential relatives’ corruption including such details, and the party president, Lee Hoi-Chang, will be briefed as soon as he returns from the visit to Japan (March 10 – 13).

An NRC authority said, “As citizens’ antipathy is growing against the recent corruption suspicions of president Kim Dae-Jung’s relatives, such measures are made. They will be used as party-president Lee’s campaign promises.”

When the NRC finalizes the measures, the opposition will discuss on the concrete range of presidential relatives to be publicized of assets.

In the NRC meeting, however, there was an objection that “presidential relatives cannot be excluded from public offices, because the employment is guaranteed to all by the constitution”Therefore, it seems that controversial criticism will be repeated until the final decision is made.

According to the present laws, national government officials or public officials above first grade and their direct family members are obliged to publicize their assets, and in cases of direct family members having independent livelihood, obligation can be denied.

Yeon-Wook Jung jyw11@donga.com