[Editorial] Public Funding Also Depends on Will

A political reform depends on the success in securing transparency of political funding. In that respect, positive is the yesterday’s announcement by National Election Commission for a public supporting system in campaigning. Major political parties responded positively, leading to the hope that the proposal would be legislated into law during the regular fall session of the Congress. Thus, it is hoped that the presidential election in December will be conducted under the new rules.

But history has repeatedly demonstrated that parties’ agreement on principles does not necessarily lead to that on details of a political reform bill. Therefore, during the public debate on the proposal, we should check it out that idealism comes before reality, and thereby prevent it from ending up in the hall of the Congress.

The key idea of the public supporting system in campaigning is to cut down factors consuming large amounts of money and, as a result, to root out the need for illegal fund raising and donations. In a nutshell, paying more directly out of taxpayers’ pockets will eventually lessen the burden on them by lowering the total of campaign money used.

This logic presupposes perfect functioning of the system. If the system does not function as expected due to failure to prevent illegal fund-raising, it will only raise the weight of burden citizens have to bear. The system conveys a high possibility of ending up with malfunctioning, considering our political history. In the past, donations were made mainly to the ruling party and matters regarding political funds were often used in suppressing the opposing parties.

The Grand National Party, for example, opposes some parts of the proposal such as the portion regarding revelation of donors of more than 1,000,000 won. The GNP argues the revelation might be abused to suppress it. Regardless of whether GNP’s argument is right or wrong, it is possible to imagine the hesitation of people in making donations to opposing parties, if their personal information is made public. We also have to clear up the doubtfulness by the GNP about fairness of some media companies. In conclusion, the success of the system depends, as before, on the will of the people in power for making the game fair.