Samsung Grant Will Fund Scholarship

The government has decided to use the 800 billion won donated to society without condition by Samsung Group to fund scholarships for marginalized students.

The government held discussions on how to use the donation and who to manage the fund, and confirmed on March 27 to have made its decision recently regarding the sum. It has also started its task to form a board of directors to manage the fund and decide on the specifics of the scholarship recipients.

Ever since President Roh commented, regarding the donation, that “the government should come up with some measures to manage the process and procedure of the 800 billion won donation to quell any wasteful debate,” government officials from the Prime Minister’s Office and the Ministry of Education and Human Resources have closely worked and discussed together on how to handle the large sum.

The discussion concluded with settling on the following principles:

To use the money as scholarship for marginalized students; not to leave the donation as a form of budget but rather manage it as a special fund through establishing a foundation; and finally, to form a board of directors to manage the foundation with the Education Ministry taking charge.

As the Samsung Group had donated the money without any condition, it will not interfere with the formation of the foundation board but will give administrative support regarding the establishment of the foundation if the government requests it.

In relation to this, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education Kim Jin-pyo held a press gathering on the same day and said, “The Education Ministry is now responsible for gathering the social consensus on how to use the fund donated by Samsung,” and added, “We are greatly concerned about how to form that consensus without igniting any kind of social conflict.”

He added, “The forming of the board of directors and the management of the foundation will go through a gathering of opinions from various sectors of our society and through reaching agreement on each step, and the Education Ministry will only take charge until the formation of the board.”

However, there are concerns that if the board is formed under the guidance of the government, then in reality there is a high probability that these board members will have the same political views or tendencies as those of the current government.

According to law professor Lee Sang-don of Chung-Ang University, “In this current situation where left-oriented civil organizations are deeply involved in the government administration, leaving the matter of forming the foundation board to the government could bring about side effects such as supporting activities that go against the order of market economy.”

Samsung Group had donated 800 billion won without any condition and stated, “The use of the fund should be decided by the government and society through discussion.”

Jeong-Hun Park In-Chul Lee sunshade@donga.com inchul@donga.com