Criticism Rises Over Roh’s Attempt to “Tailor” Ongoing Investigation

Last Friday, President Roh openly talked about the ongoing probe into former presidential aide Jeong Yun-jae, who is under investigation for his alleged special treatment in a corruption scandal, saying, “Allegations without substance are flaring up these days.” South Koreans have raised their eyebrows over his remarks.

His comment came right after the Busan DA’s office announced that it would look further into the bribery scandal involving Jeong.

President Roh has a long history of making remarks that were seemingly intended to pressure ongoing investigations involving his men or himself.

Back in December 2003 after he won the presidential election, for example, the DA’s office was investigating election campaign spending of presidential candidates, including Roh himself. Roh, however, publicly said, “I swear I will resign if I spent more than one tenth of what the Grand National Party (“GNP”) used during the campaign.”

The politicians as well as the authorities interpreted his comment as some sort of guideline, under which in no case the money spent by candidate Roh should be more than one tenth of the GNP’s spending.

The prosecution found out that the GNP spent $82.3 million from the illegal donations during the presidential campaign, and Roh spent one eighth of it, or $11.9 million. In response, Roh modified his stance and said, “Well, the difference comes from different definitions of spending items. In any case, my spending was not more than tens of thousands of dollars.”

Previously in May 2003, he wielded his “verbal power” again and was criticized for allegedly trying influencing a DA probe into one of his loyal men, Ahn Hee-jung. Ahn was accused of having received kickbacks from Nara, a financial institution. Roh openly referred to Ahn as friend and partner, drawing criticism from the public.

In April this year, Ahn got accused again, and Roh poked in his nose again. Ahn had contacted North Korean officials in October 2006 without filing proper applications with the Unification Ministry. President Roh took the law into his own hands and interpreted it to his taste, saying, “The ministry has no jurisdiction over the matter.” On the same day, the ministry publicly declared that Ahn’s conduct did not violate the law.

The long history does not stop there. In October 2003, when the nation was engulfed in a debate over whether Korean-German socialist Song Du-yul had engaged in espionage, he said something that sounded like an appeal to the nation for lenience in a congressional speech, saying, “Punishment, as important as it is, does not get us anywhere. This is a chance to show to the world how tolerant the Korean society became.” Later, the prosecutor who led the “Song” investigation and detained him failed to get promoted twice and resigned.

A former high-ranking prosecutor said, “The top brass in the prosecution are prone to ‘presidential influences,’ especially concerning cases involving members of the president’s inner circle. He is the one who can dismiss them. Actually, we have come up with unintended results to cater to presidents.” He continued, “Roh should not make any comment that might influence the outcome of an investigation.”

jin0619@donga.com