One of the reasons the general public has lost faith in members of the National Assembly is that they — contrary to the expectations of the people who elected them — have such low ethical standards.
One need look no further than the fact that a total of 22 members of the current 19th Assembly lost their seats due to convictions. Their charges range from election law violations to bribery and influence-peddling. The number is likely to increase, as a further 10 are facing trial.
That being the case, a string of scandals involving Assembly members has been adding to the public’s already deep frustration with legislators.
The most recent case surrounds Park Dae-dong of the Saenuri Party. News reports said that Park made one of his secretaries return part of his monthly salary — 1.2 million won ($1,000) — for 13 months.
The secretary, who resigned in January last year, was quoted as saying that Park had him send the money through an intern at his office and that the money was used for the lawmaker’s personal expenses, including utility bills and other costs for his apartment.
Park said he was short on money for running his constituency office in Ulsan and that the former secretary consented to his suggestion to contribute part of his monthly salary. But it seems more likely to be a case of extortion.
The controversy was preceded by an outrageous case involving Noh Young-min, a three-term lawmaker from the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy.
Noh, who held the post of chairman of the powerful Industry, Trade and Energy Committee, had a credit card terminal at his Assembly office to sell a book he published last month. Those who bought tens of copies of the book included officials from government offices and public enterprises audited by the committee headed by Noh. He resigned from his post, but that should not exempt him from due punishment for, among other things, violating the law that requires card machines to be used only at places of business.
The two latest cases came on the heels of scandals involving three lawmakers whose children were either lawyers or law school students. Shin Ki-nam of the NPAD came under fire for allegedly trying to peddle influence following the failure of his son to pass the graduation exam of a law school in Seoul.
Yoon Hu-duk of the NPAD and Kim Tae-won of the Saenuri Party were found to have sought favors from employers to land their children positions as lawyers.
As public criticism mounts, the NPAD’s internal auditing body said it had asked the party’s ethics panel to investigate the cases of Noh and Shin. If the past is any guide, however, one should not expect the party to take any serious action against them. That leaves the job of weeding out unethical public servants to voters. It’s good we are having an election in four months.
