Uri Party policy committee chairman Kang Bong Kyun's statement that conglomerate investment restrictions should be abolished was inappropriate, and for many reasons. To begin with it is inappropriate timing, since the restrictions are set to be reviewed at the end of the year, when a three year market reform program comes to a close.
Fair Trade Commission (FTC) chairman Kang Chul Kyu, who has long argued for the need for those restrictions, happened to have his three years in office come to a close on the very same day Kang Bong Kyun made the comments in question. If he disagreed with Kang Chul Kyu he could have discussed the issue with the new FTC chairman. It was irresponsible for him as a leader in his party to talk as if he'd been just waiting for Kang Chul Kyu to leave the scene.
There is also something wrong with his perception of the issue. "There was a problem with cross-investment being by companies to excessively inflate their size," he said. "But now the problem has solved much of itself." That is exactly what the jaebeol are claiming. Jaebeol tycoons use the method to control the huge conglomerates with just 5 percent stakes in the whole jaebeol. How is that "mostly resolved"? He also ignored the fact that those restrictions have been effective in preventing indiscriminate expansion. He has the order of things backwards.
It was even more shocking to hear him say such restrictions "don't exist in developed nations." Maybe it would be another thing if he had always been a politician, but Kang Bong Kyun was once the president's chief economic secretary and later Minister of Finance and Economy, and in that capacity he was in charge of jaebeol reform. He is trying to confuse public opinion, since he surely knows that it is jaebeols that don't exist in developed nations, and it is a unique situation in Korea that requires having those restrictions in place.
They are, of course, rules that exist only in Korea and will some day be a part of history. First, however, there will have to be some deep-reaching results in jaebeol reform. Most importantly, the country first needs to make sure that there would not be a return of the ill effects cross-investment causes. The right order of business would be to establish ample oversight measures and decide whether the restrictions should be done away with after a process of public debate.
The Hankyoreh, 10 March 2006.
[Translations by Seoul Selection]
[Editorial] Kang Bong Kyun's Inappropriate Comments |
