[Editorial] Asset Disclosures Must Be More Transparent

Once again you see how real estate is an important personal financial tool for high-ranking public servants. Six or seven of the top ten ranking officials increased their assets over the past year through real estate deals and inheritance, and half of those who had to disclose their holdings own property in Gangnam. The high concentration of real estate ownership in Gangnam by government bureaucrats, members of the National Assembly, high-ranking judges, and other members of our society's leadership show you how twisted things are in Korean society. You wonder how the country will believe officials when they say they are going to "get a firm hold on the cost of housing in Gangnam" when individuals who are supposed to either pass or implement real estate policy have financial interests in what happens.

There is nothing wrong with high-ranking public officials owning real estate. The time when owning a lot of real estate was itself something the people judged them for is gone, as long as they don't engage in illegal or roundabout means to buy, hold, and sell it.

The current law on ethics for public servants, however, does not do enough in the way of assuring transparent disclosure and strict verification. Because it only reveals asset increases from the past year, there's no way to know how they came to own the property or where they got their money from. They can refuse to disclose property in their children's' names, and there is no way to pick how what if anything has been put in the names of family relatives. Sometimes there is a huge difference between market price and what they actually state. The public servants ethics committee has demanded censure for failure to report personal assets in good faith in less than twenty instances. Meanwhile calls for disclosure of how they came across their assets has been nothing but words, and for years. The ruling party made legislating that part of its platform last year, but a year has passed without it being discussed in the concerned National Assembly committee. The bill on creating a system of blind trust for real estate, like that which exists for stock holdings, also got nowhere.

This time around as well you might see a few officials come under suspicion for speculative real estate investment. But it must not happen in a way that means you are just out of luck for coming under public scrutiny. There urgently needs to be improvement in the way this is done, so that all the details of how a person put his wealth together are disclosed, and so that there is stronger verification and punishment for violations.

The Hankyoreh, 2 March 2006.

[Translations by Seoul Selection]