[Editorial] Endless Suspicion Surrounding President’s Associates

Series of bribery suspicions surrounding the President’s associates are frustrating the people. Following the suspicion that Lee Kwan-jae, Secretary to the President for Policy Process and Reengineering, received money from a top official of a company in the tourism and leisure industry, the president’s former senior advisor of general affairs, Choi Do-sul is suspected of accepting bribes from SK group and is under investigation by the prosecutor. Both men are considered to be among the closest associates to President Roh, especially Mr. Choi who was known to have worked with President Roh for 20 years in Roh’s lawyer’s office and in the Pusan constituency office.

That is not it. During Roh’s elected days, his political advisor, Yum Dong-yun, has been arrested for being involved in an unlawful lobby but became unrestrained. Another associate of the president, Vice-Director Ahn Hee-jung of Millennium Democratic Party’s National Strategy Research was also indicted for being involved in the same case. Yang Gil-seung, former 1st division secretary to the president also created a stir with his night club-case. Never before did any president’s associate in such number stir up the entire country within a few months of taking office.

The Roh administration boasted that the foundation of the administration’s legitimacy is reform and morality. Their mindset of dividing the society into either mainstream or non-mainstream is also based on the belief that they are morally on top of others. But with the series of bribery cases involving Roh’s associates, we realize how false and misrepresented such beliefs are.

The suspicions themselves drive people into the feeling of loss. How could people who need to worry about their immediate situations in this period of economic hardship trust and depend on such an administration? What hope can they have?

The prosecution needs to strictly decipher these suspicions and charges with thorough investigations. There should not be any undermining of honest investigation in favor of current political situations. That is the least they can do for the people of Korea.