Suspicions about corruption in the Cheonggyecheon redevelopment project continue to grow. Seoul vice mayor Yang Yun Jae was arrested in bribery charges. Now Kim Il Ju, the former head of a local committee for the Grand National Party (GNP) has been arrested on charges he received W1.4 billion from a real estate developer for arranging a meeting with mayor Lee Myung Bak. Everyone is claiming his innocence, so the investigation is just getting started.
The prosecution first needs to figure out what the facts are. It needs to uncover where the money was used and how much there was. One wants to know the truth behind the statement by the developer that the vice mayor said he would have to give him W6 billion "because more than W1,000 billion in profit is expected." Lee says he does not even know Kim. That would mean that the money that a man who was an utter stranger to the mayor gave him seven times the amount that was given to the vice mayor. That is another question that has to be answered. It is of the utmost importance that investigators figure out whether there were others involved.
Figuring out the whole of what happened will inevitably require that the investigation is expanded to include the whole of the Cheonggyecheon restoration project. The redevelopment area that is now a problem was once abandoned by the state-run Korea National Housing Corporation because the building height limit made it unprofitable, and the common position is that no contractor would get involved in the area unless he was sure the height restrictions were going to be relaxed. That being the case, prosecutors will have to look into whether the city development plan of 2003 that included easing the building height limits was the result of bribery.
GNP floor leader Kang Jae Sup said, "this investigation must not be pursued politically, as an attack on a local government head like with Incheon mayor Ahn Sang Soo or to divert attention from the oilfield project suspicions," and demanded a impartial investigation. He is entirely correct, and that should apply equally to the GNP. The GNP went on the offensive against the prosecution in Ahn's case, saying its own investigation found there was no basis for the charges. It has moral responsibility in this case and therefore needs to refrain from political strategizing and maintain self-control.
The Hankyoreh, 11 May 2005.
[Translations by Seoul Selection (PMS)]
[Editorial] Investigate Everything About Cheonggyecheon |