hankyoreh

Kim Su-hyeon

Lee Sang-hoon, board chairman of Samsung Electronics, and other former and current Samsung Group executives were referred for trial on charges of personally developing and implementing union-busting operations.

Prosecutors called their actions “organized crime similar to military operations mobilizing company-wide capabilities.” But they were unable to produce evidence of involvement from members of the ruling Lee family – including Chairman Lee Kun-hee, who has stressed a “no union” management approach. Prosecutors plan a further investigation of union-busting operations at Samsung Everland to determine whether the orders came from the Lee clan.

“To enforce the ‘no union’ management passed down from the earliest stages of the company, the human resources support team in the Samsung Group’s Future Strategy Office (FSO) directed the comprehensive planning and execution of union-busting operations,” the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office public criminal investigation department (headed by Senior Prosecutor Kim Su-hyeon) declared in announcing findings on Sept. 27 from its investigation into alleged union-busting at Samsung Electronics and Samsung Electronics Service (Samsung SVC).

The prosecutors also alleged that the FSO and others “drafted union-busting strategy documents each year to review the different affiliates’ response posture, with the results reflected in human resource assessments for labor affairs management.”

A 2013 FSO-drafted labor-management strategy document acquired by prosecutors likened union establishment to “encroachment by a malignant virus,” presenting a “greening” strategy for starving unions, which makes union members move to different affiliates. It also ordered Samsung Electronics to create a general situation room and rapid response team to conduct union-busting operations in an orderly, systematic fashion along military lines. In the process, a union expert and former policy aide to the Minister of Employment and Labor was contracted at a rate of 20 million won (US$18,000) in pay and 60 million won (US$54,000) in contingent payments.

In all, around 1.3 billion won (US$1,170,000) was found to have been paid to enforce the “attrition strategy” against unions. The investigation also uncovered the collection of sensitive personal information on union members – including matters such as pregnancies, marriage/divorce, and assets – for use by “angel agents” in encouraging them to leave the union.

“Union-busting was carried out in a more clever and discreet manner than the ones used by the union-busting specialists at Creative Consulting,” the prosecutors claimed.

While the investigation determined that the union-busting strategy “master plan” was composed by the FSO – the former control tower transmitting directives from the Samsung Group’s headquarters to its individual affiliates – prosecutors explained that “no evidence was obtained showing involvement or collusion by the ruling family.”

“This will need to be examined in the future when we investigate Everland and other Samsung affiliates,” they added.

Rating their own investigation into Samsung’s union-busting operations the same day, prosecutors said they had “uncovered the full picture about truths that everyone knew but no one could confirm.”

“This was a veritable department store of customized union-busting tactics in the name of ‘labor affairs management,’ covering everything from the union founding stage to its maturity,” they added, describing the approach as “organized crime and an infringement upon workers’ basic rights.”

Prosecutors previously declined to press charges against Lee Kun-hee and others when Justice Party lawmaker Sim Sang-jung first revealed the so-called “S group labor-management strategy” document showing Samsung’s union-busting operations in Oct. 2013. The reinvestigation was launched by “chance” when a document on union-busting operations was obtained in February during an investigation into allegations that Samsung paid ex-President Lee Myung-bak’s legal fees for the BBK case on his behalf.

On Sept. 27, prosecutors indicted 28 Samsung executives and managers without detention for Labor Union Act and other violations, including Lee Sang-hoon, Samsung Electronics vice president Kang Gyeong-hun, former Samsung SVC president Park Sang-beom, and current president Choi Woo-soo. Also referred for trial were three Korea Employers Federation (KEF) staff who assisted Samsung with labor-management negotiations.

Prosecutors described the KEF – which was entrusted with labor-management negotiation rights – as having “approached the talks solely in terms of Samsung’s interests, using them as a tool to maintain Samsung’s ‘no union’ management approach.”

Samsung Electronics and Samsung SVC were also charged with illegal dispatch worker practices in violation of the Protection, etc. of Dispatched Workers Act. Prosecutors previously arrested and indicted four executives on the same charge between June and August, including Samsung SVC executive director Choi Pyeong-seok and former Samsung Electronics vice president Mok Jang-kyun.

By Hyun So-eun and Kim Yang-jin, staff reporter

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]