[Editorial] On a New Lead about Roh’s Slush Funds

The prosecution reportedly has found new clues suggesting that the Roh Moo-hyun camp received one billion won in illicit funds from the Lotte Group during last year’s presidential race. The government has reportedly secured a statement by a Lotte executive who was under investigation. For the first time since four months ago when the issue of fairness in prosecution probes was first raised, a new lead exists in which the Roh camp received a large sum of money from one of the country’s Big Five conglomerates.

Then, what gained ground are the Grand National Party’s allegations that 73.2 billion won-versus-zero prosecution probes are biased. Seventy-two billion won versus zero refers to the volume of slush funds the prosecutors said the GNP presidential candidate Lee Hoi-chang and Roh Moo-hyun respectively raised from the Big Five. Now the score has become 732 billion to one billion. It is hard to predict how the score will change. Could other conglomerates have sat by when Lotte gave Roh one billion won?

Rep. Kim Kyung-jae of the Millennium Democratic Party said at a session of the National Assembly yesterday that he reported to then-MDP presidential candidate Roh during the campaign period last year that Samsung had showed a willingness to donate political funds. He added that Roh had appointed someone to collect money from Samsung.

The prosecution must not slacken its pace of probes into the Roh camp. It should not end probes into the Roh camp and corporations halfway through just because it has decided to wrap all investigations into politicians by March 6. It must immediately investigate the veracity of Rep. Kim’s allegations.

If the prosecution fails to deal with the dispute over the impartiality of its probe, the aftershock will be huge. Another standoff is likely impending as the GNP has decided to convene an extra National Assembly session in March in an attempt to counter what it say is biased prosecution probes. Most of all, why do they have to become engaged in the dispute over prosecution fairness while putting the April elections on the backburner? The probes should be wrapped up transparently before the elections.