President Moon Reportedly One of the Original Founders of the Hankyoreh Newspaper

Here is an interesting tidbit about President Moon, he supposedly help fund the creation of the left wing Hankyoreh newspaper back in the 1980’s to help get favorable coverage for himself and former President Roh Moo-hyun:

South Korean President Moon Jae-In was among a group of investors who made large donations in the 1980s to establish the left-wing Hankyoreh Media Group, a report said.
Moon gave 200 million won ($552,000 in 2019 dollars) to the media group, which established the far-left Hankyoreh newspaper in 1987, according to a Jan. 28 report by East Asia Research Center.

The report also noted that Moon was the only one of the original investment group to not be refunded his donation.
Moon “purposely did not get the money back, the only one to refuse to take back the money,” the report said. (…….)

The report said: “In the late 1980s, when Hankyoreh, centered around dismissed journalists from Donga Ilbo andChosun Ilbo, started to raise funds to start a newspaper, [Moon] gave 200,000,000 won without any hesitation.  But at the time, Moon Jae-In, then a lawyer, was not in a position to readily give the 200,000,000 won.  He didn’t have that much money, living in an apartment with 2,000,000 won ($5,520) ‘Jeonse’ [refundable down payment, no monthly rent]. But Moon was determined to make a good press and obtained a loan to make the generous contribution. Thanks to Moon and 20,000 investors, Hankyoreh newspaper raised 5,000,000,000 won ($13.8 million) and printed 500,000 initial copies.”

Song In-Bae, Moon’s longtime associate and current chief personal secretary, was quoted in the report as saying: “Hankyoreh started to return the money to everyone, but there is one person to whom the money was not returned, and that is Moon Jae-In…Hankyoreh wants to return the money, but he still refused to accept.”
Song also stated that Moon gave the money in order for Hankyoreh to establish a branch in Busan, where Moon and Rho Moo-Hyun had their law office and were active politically. Rho, South Korea’s president from 2003-2008, died in 2009.
On April 9, 2017 when Moon was a presidential candidate, he said to a Hankoyreh journalist: “I think Hankyoreh has love for me and my party. I hope you remember that I’m a founding member of Hankyoreh.”

World Tribune

You can read more at the link as well as over at the East Asia Research Center.