hankyoreh

the Saenuri Party’s floor spokesman explains allegations that the Korean Government Employees‘ Union allegedly conspired with then-Democratic Party (DP) candidate Moon Jae-in on illegal election campaigning in last December’s presidential campaign

By Kim Nam-il and Lee Seung-jun, staff reporters

The Saenuri Party (NFP) is taking increasingly outrageous steps to divert attention from allegations that the country’s intelligence agencies attempted to manipulate public opinion around the time of last December’s presidential election.

In the latest move, the party is calling on prosecutors to investigate the Korean Government Employees' Union (KGEU) for allegedly conspiring with then Democratic Party (DP) candidate Moon Jae-in on illegal election campaigning.

The KGEU was not a legally recognized union at the time, with the government refusing to even accept its establishment notification form.

Critics are accusing the party of trying to divert attention from the NIS allegations by portraying the entire government employee organization as having campaigned illegally on Moon’s behalf. The move comes after a court allowed a change to the indictment of former NIS director Won Sei-hoon, who had been confident it would be disallowed.

The accusations began at a Nov. 1 briefing by Kim Tae-heum, the Saenuri Party’s floor spokesman.

“During the last election, then candidate Moon Jae-in’s election camp entered a policy agreement to win the KGEU’s support, and government employees with KGEU launched an indiscriminate and illegal election campaign using social media,” Kim claimed.

“They used 140,000 KGEU government employees, people who are required to maintain neutrality in elections, and had them systematically perpetrate illegal campaigning,” he added.

Kim went on to call the Democratic Party “shameless and hypocritical” for remaining silent on the KGEU members’ actions while accusing the NIS of illegal election interference because of “alleged actions by a few agents.”

At an earlier party meeting to develop measures for the parliamentary audit, Saenuri lawmaker Yi Wan-young said, “We need to be as rigorous about the KGEU as we are with the NIS internet posts.”

Two other Saenuri lawmakers, Kim Jin-tae and Lee Ju-young, called for an investigation of the KGEU at a National Assembly Legislative and Judiciary Committee confirmation/inspection.

Minister of Justice Hwang Kyo-an said, “If we get a lead in the investigation, I think we should investigate it thoroughly according to the law.”

And during a parliamentary audit in the National Assembly Security and Public Administration Committee, lawmaker Hwang Young-cheul said the KGEU needed to be “promptly investigated,” to which Minister of Public Administration and Security Yoo Jeong-bok replied, “We plan to do so.”

Analysts said the party’s sudden decision to go after the KGEU for illegal campaigning, and the ministers’ remarks about an investigation, are an attempt by the ruling party to quiet public objections to allegations of intelligence agency interference in last December’s presidential election.

They came after President Park Geun-hye said in a meeting of Blue House senior secretaries the day before that steps were needed “to ensure there are not any violations of political neutrality by state institutions, government employee groups, or individual government employees.”

Indeed, Park’s remarks about requiring political neutrality from government employee groups - coming amid revelations of election interference by state institutions with large budgets and specialized personnel, including the military’s Cyber Command and the Ministry of Patriots’ and Veterans’ Affairs as well as the NIS - opened the way for the Saenuri Party to demand action on internet posts by individual government employees.

Speaking on a radio program, Saenuri Party secretary-general Hong Moon-jong said, “What the President said means no one can interfere in politics regardless of who they are.”

The reference to the KTU was particularly telling. After being stripped of its legal status by the administration, an act taken by many as a sign of intensifying labor movement suppression, the union is now being used as part of the attempt to divert attention from the election interference scandal.

Over the course of the scandal, the Saenuri Party has repeatedly changed tactics in the face of new evidence. After first accusing the DP of refusing to accept the outcome of the election, which Park won, it then accused prosecutors Chae Dong-wook and Yoon Seok-yeol of political bias, argued that the internet posts did not have any effect on the election, and maintained that the bill of indictment against former NIS direction Won Sei-hoon could not altered.

The party’s recent victory in by-elections on Oct. 30 was also presented as a sign that the opposition’s attempts to hold the administration responsible had failed.

“The NIS did something it should not do, and the KGEU entered a political agreement with a political party as a union before a presidential election,” said DP spokesman Park Yong-jin. “This is a typical attempt by the Saenuri Party to draw the public’s attention away from a scandal.”

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