"Prosecutorial Reform, an Important Task... Should Not Be Used as an Excuse to Silence Criticism"
"Why No Achievements in Prosecutorial Reform? Because Prosecutors Were Given Strong Power During the Eradication of Deep-rooted Evils"
[Asia Economy Reporter Heo Midam] Geum Tae-seop, a former member of the Democratic Party who was disciplined by his party for abstaining from voting on the establishment bill of the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO), criticized on the 24th by mentioning former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk and Minister of Justice Choo Mi-ae, saying, "'Prosecutorial reform' is a magic spell. No matter what attacks come, if you say, 'Prosecutorial reform is urgent right now, why are you doing this?' it shuts down the response."
On the same day, Geum posted on his Facebook, "The slogan 'prosecutorial reform' is being abused as an excuse to avoid awkward situations. To defeat forces trying to obstruct prosecutorial reform, they say that even if there are disagreements, do not speak and keep quiet," he said.
He stated, "There may be resistance to reform. However, the much more significant reason why prosecutorial reform is stagnant is the lack of experience and immaturity in hastily pushing through crude reform plans, blatantly biased personnel appointments that cause disdain, and above all, hypocrisy and unfairness that fully utilize the power of the prosecution when it is advantageous to our side but completely change their stance when our side is under investigation," he sharply criticized.
He continued, "These things have caused the legitimacy and momentum of the reform to be lost," adding, "Prosecutorial reform is an important task. It should not be consumed as an excuse or pretext to suppress voices of criticism as it is now. This is the intention behind the article I wrote," introducing the content of his column.
In the column, former lawmaker Geum said, "'Prosecutorial reform' is a magic spell. No matter what attacks come, regardless of context, if you say, 'Prosecutorial reform is urgent right now, why are you doing this?' it becomes an answer," adding, "When pointing out the inconsistency in words and actions of former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk, the rebuttal is, 'We are not ignorant; we are silent because prosecutorial reform is important.' Regarding the military service issue of the current Minister of Justice Choo Mi-ae's son, there is openly voiced argument that 'If Choo Mi-ae collapses, prosecutorial reform will fly away, and eventually, the Moon Jae-in government will face a crisis.'"
He added, "Because the atmosphere is like this, the media implicitly categorizes those who support former Minister Cho or Minister Choo as people who value prosecutorial reform, and those who criticize as people who prioritize other values over prosecutorial reform," and said, "Some even accuse critics of resisting reform. I think this logic is really absurd," he pointed out.
Also, former lawmaker Geum said, "The reasons why the prosecutorial reform, which started loudly at the beginning of the Moon Jae-in administration, has not produced significant results and remains stagnant even after three years can be summarized into three," and said, "First, it is because the prosecution was given tremendous power during the purge of deep-rooted evils."
He explained, "Even former Minister Cho, during his time as Senior Secretary for Civil Affairs when the purge was in full swing, announced that 'direct investigation by the prosecution will be recognized only for special investigations that the prosecution is doing well,' but when he himself came under investigation, he tried to abolish the special investigation division, which drew cynicism for being inconsistent."
He continued, "Second, it is because prosecutorial reform was attempted to be used for other purposes," recalling, "Around the end of 2017, a few months before the local elections, when I was the Democratic Party's floor leader in the Legislation and Judiciary Committee, I received a request from a Blue House official to pass the CIO law by the end of that year."
He said, "I answered that the official should persuade opposition party lawmakers and push forward in a way that would be an achievement for the opposition as well, otherwise it would be difficult to produce results," and criticized, "I still cannot forget that person’s frustrated expression when he said, 'We are not fools either. We know it won’t pass within this year. But if we strongly push the CIO law and the opposition opposes it, we will look like the reform forces and they will look like the conservative forces. Then winning the local elections is a done deal.'"
Former lawmaker Geum also pointed out the incompetence of those in charge as a reason for the sluggish prosecutorial reform, saying, "At the start of the government, both the Senior Secretary for Civil Affairs at the Blue House, who was the commander of prosecutorial reform work, and the Minister of Justice were appointed from academia. I don’t know about their legal theory, but they had almost no experience in prosecutorial practice or personnel matters. As a result, many concrete reform plans were crude."
Finally, he emphasized, "The term prosecutorial reform should not be used as an excuse or pretext to avoid criticism of the government or awkward situations," and said, "The claim that criticism of the ethics of high-ranking officials is intended to obstruct prosecutorial reform is groundless."
He added, "You don’t have to support the government’s plan in specific policies to be reformist. We all want reform. There is not much time left. Please, let’s properly carry out prosecutorial reform," he stressed.
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