Guarantee of Incumbent Prosecutor General’s Term of Office

Lee Hoi-chang, presidential candidate of the Grand National Party, said on Nov. 19, "In order to prevent possible political reprisal through the prosecution’s investigations, it should be free from the government. If I came to power, I would make the prosecutor general have power in personnel affairs through the prosecution’s personnel committee and guarantee the term of office of Prosecutor General Kim Gak-yeong."

In one of this newspaper’s series of interviews with presidential candidates, Lee stressed, "It did not make sense that the one who will be elected as new president throws down power in the prosecution’s personnel matters because of its investigation in the past." As for the declaration of the president’s relatives’ properties to keep in check corruptions involving them, Lee said that he would make in public his property if he were elected as president. He went further saying he would consider reporting financial status of all presidential candidates and strengthen senior government officials’ ethics codes in a way such as abolition of their rights to deny the notification of their assets.

In addition, with regard to the single candidacy talks between Roh Moo-hyun, presidential candidate of the Millennium Democratic Party, and his National Alliance 21 counterpart, Lee said, "The talks reminds us of the political alliance between the incumbent President Kim Dae-jung and Kim Jong-pil in the past, but now there is no cause for such a political alliance. Though now the single candidacy negotiation is drawing voters’ attention, they will not agree on it when they have to choose."

Now there are suspicions that the Office of the President Cheong Wa Dae is behind the political merger between Roh and Chung. For this, the GNP candidate warned that if it turned out true, it would not just sit on its hands.

As for the National Election Commission’s decision that allows one round of TV debate between Roh and Chung, he said that the debate itself would work as an election campaign, so it runs counter to the import of the law. He added, "The commission should not be swayed by politics. Its decision that one debate would be O.K., though several rounds of debate are not doesn’t make sense."

In regard to the North’s nuclear issue, Lee related, "If I came to power, I would have candid talks with Kim Jong-il, chairman of North Korea’s National Defense Commission. I will not take an approach in which the South decides on the terms of conversation and if the terms are not met by it, it gives up on North Korea. But I will make clear what the public wants to say."

Yeon-Wook Jung jyw11@donga.com