Yang Received Requests while Being Wined and Dined

The president`s personal secretary, Yang Gil-seung, turned out to have received requests from the owner of a night club identified as K in Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, and the vice chief of the ruling Millennium Democratic Party’s local chapter, Oh Won-bae, when he was treated to drinks on June 28.

The total cost of spending the evening at the high-end nightclub in question turned out to be 2.15 million won, a far cry from the initial figure of 430,000 won. In addition, Mr. Yang was given expensive gifts worth about 450,000 won.

After briefed on the results of the fact-finding investigation by presidential chief of staff Moon Hee-sang, President Roh Moo-hyun adopted the decision by the personnel committee to accept Yang’s resignation on Tuesday.

While drinking together, the owner of the nightclub, identified only by his surname of Lee, complained of unfairness, saying that the North Chungcheong provincial police were targeting only his nightclub for tax evasion while ignoring other rival clubs, senior secretary to the president for civil affairs Moon Jae-in said, meeting with reporters.

Moon explained that Mr. Oh only asked Yang to find out whether the tax investigation into his club was unfair. Yet that at that time, Yang did not respond to the request, nor did he influence the prosecution or police.

According to the investigation, the presidential personal secretary, Mr. Oh, Mr. Lee, Jeong Hwa-sam, the president’s high school alumnus, and three waitresses drank together at the nightclub. One of the waitresses followed Yang back to his hotel room but he asked her to leave.

Mr. Lee and a co-owner of the club, known only as Mr. Han, picked up the tab for the evening, totaling 2.15 million won.

The office of the senior secretary for civil affairs pointed out that Yang was given lavish treatment and expensive gifts.

However, Cheong Wa Dae did not investigate who recorded the videotape and just said that it referred the case to the prosecution for further investigation.

At a personnel committee meeting held at Cheong Wa Dae Tuesday, the presidential senior secretary was briefed on the results of its own investigation and suggested that the president accept Yang’s resignation, saying Yang himself wanted it to be accepted as he knew punishment of one kind or another was inevitable, according to Yoon Tai-young.

Young-Hae Choi yhchoi65@donga.com