Illegal Political Funds Collected During Last Presidential Election Will Be Targeted on Exit Poll Investigation

Senior prosecutor Ahn Dae-hee announced his consideration to launch a so-called “exit poll investigation” targeting illegal political funds delivered to the opposition Grand National Party’s district chapters during last year presidential campaign.

Ahn said, “It is a principle of law to take illegal political funds back to its original place. If we cannot do that through the court, we have no choice but to visit those who spent the funds and question them on how they spent it. This means that it forces us to resort to ‘exit poll investigation,’ doesn’t it?”

However, Ahn added, “Since it is practically difficult to investigate and target each district chapter, we are now mulling over how to do it.”

Last Tuesday, the court sentenced Lee Jae-hyun, a former GNP financial official arrested for accepting 66.2 billion won in illegal political funds from Samsung, LG, and Hyundai Motor Co., to two and half years in jail and four years probation saying, “It is impossible to take back funds delivered to the parties according to the political funds law.”

Ahn also added, “During the 17th general election, two GNP party heads of district chapters in the Seoul area and the Yeongnam area are suspected of accepting 200 million won respectively. We are currently investigating it.” The prosecution prosecuted Kim Yung-chun, chairman of Seohai Construction Co., Ltd and Gweon Hong-sa, chairman of Bando Co., Ltd, for furnishing illegal political funds to Rep Chyung Dai-chul (the Uri Party) and Ahn Hee-jung, President Roh Moo-hyun’s aides, with 300 million won and 200 million won respectively. Meanwhile, the prosecution revealed the contents of the 58 billion won out of 80 billion won collected by the GNP during the last presidential campaigning when it announced the middle investigation report on March 8. According to the announcement, the GNP spent 46.5 billion won in supporting the district chapters, three billion won in scouting new candidates, 2.5 billion won in facilitating party management, 2.5 billion won in supporting rallies, 2.5 billion won in managing private organizations, and one billion won in conducting national polls. Also, the prosecution confirmed during the announcement that after the presidential election, the GNP spent 2.6 billion won additionally. The prosecution, in addition, revealed that the Roh Moo-hyun camp provided district chapters 4.25 billion won, composed of two billion won illegal political funds and 2.25 billion won, which was suspected as illegal funds.

jin0619@donga.com