There is hot debate about Justice Minister Chun Jung Bae's decision to invoke his authority to direct a prosecution investigation. But with extreme contentions being made that distract from the issue the controversy is becoming wasteful arguing and that is very lamentable. Claims that he is trying to "tame the prosecution" or "destroying law and order," and that the intention is to "render the National Security Law powerless" might be good tools in provoking and agitating the prosecution and in politicizing the issue, but they are way out of touch with the essence of the matter at hand and are far from productive.
For starters, we do understand well enough how the prosecution must feel shock and a sense of dilemma at the fact a justice minister has chosen to exercise authority over an investigation for the first time in constitutional history. But what must be noted is that it is the first time it is being done openly. There were numerous occasions during the authoritarian regimes that justice ministers secretly issued directives to the country's top prosecutor, and there were many cases where they went right over the chief prosecutor and told regional and working-level prosecutors how to go about their investigations. In that sense, Chun's decision means our society has made a step in the direction of progress, from closed-room decisions to openness. The prosecution's concern about the possibility the justice minister could overuse such authority, therefore, seems unfounded. This is a very exceptional move, and we think there exists a social consensus that says it should not be repeated if possible. The justice minister, for his part, needs to accept responsibility for his judgment and the results now that he has chosen to exercise his authority.
Secondly, prosecutors need to rid themselves of the mistaken thinking that their judgment is always right. They should of course have the authority to investigate independently, without wrongful interference from politicians and those in power, but that does not mean they should be free from all checks and get to wield omnipotent power. That is just organizational selfishness. In that sense, the current situation suggests the need to create a surer framework for prosecution authority and checks against it.
Thirdly, this incident needs to be the point of departure for ending the long-followed practice of overusing the power of arrest. Law enforcement authorities have been accustomed to arresting suspects first and figuring things out later. The general sentiment among the people has tended to be that arrest equals guilt and non-arrest equals innocence. It is time to put a clear end to that practice and perception. Clearly anyone can see that in this case there are no "concerns regarding the destruction of evidence or the suspect taking flight" in the case against professor Kang Jeong Ku. Chun is not asserting Kang's innocence and he did not order the prosecution to cease its investigation. Some people might ask why the Justice Ministry is quiet on other cases and then got involved only in Kang's case. While that criticism is not entirely without merit, the issue of unnecessarily putting people under arrest was something that was going to have to be dealt with eventually. Though late in coming, now is as good a time as any to work on fostering this case in a direction that guarantees the civil rights of the people to the greatest degree, by correcting the misled practice.
Finally, it is time to seriously discuss the existence of the National Security Law (NSL) again. The "liberal democratic society" we seek to become is a society where everyone can freely express their opinions, where there is tolerance for thinking different than one's own, and in which people are not criminally prosecuted because their views differ from the overwhelming majority. The NSL wholly denies the basic thesis of liberal democracy. Voltaire's famous quote "I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it" perfectly applies in Kang's case. The National Assembly, and in particular the ruling Uri Party, should stop worrying about the case turning into a debate about the NSL and instead actively work to abolish it.
The Hankyoreh, 14 October 2005.
[Translations by Seoul Selection (PMS)]
[Editorial] Justice Minister's Action and Productive Debate |
