It appears that the confirmation process for Cho Kuk was drawn out specifically to pass the deadline for calling witnesses like the opposition party wanted to do. Because of this only Cho Kuk will testify and of course he will deny everything and then get appointed as the next Justice Minister and then subsequently have the power to squash any investigation in to him:
Cho Kuk speaks to reporters during his commute to the hearing preparation office on Sept. 4, 2019. (Yonhap)
South Korea’s ruling and main opposition parties on Wednesday agreed to hold a confirmation hearing for a disputed justice minister candidate later this week.
The rival parties had been in a row over scheduling the parliamentary hearing of Justice Minister nominee Cho Kuk, who faces corruption allegations involving his family.
The dramatic agreement was reached during a meeting at the National Assembly between Na Kyung-won, floor leader of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP), and her ruling Democratic Party (DP) counterpart Lee In-young.
“There was a gap in our opinion, but we’ve agreed to hold a confirmation hearing for Cho on Friday judging that it is desirable to fulfill the parliament’s duty,” Na told reporters.
Lee said the two sides have agreed not to request that Cho’s family members attend the hearing.
“The legal deadline for summoning witnesses has passed. We will be proceeding with the confirmation hearing without witnesses,” the DP floor leader said.
The Moon administration is continuing to try and push Cho Kuk into the powerful Justice Minister position despite the corruption allegations:
Kang Gi-jung, senior Cheong Wa Dae secretary for political affairs, holds a press briefing on Aug. 30, 2019.
Cheong Wa Dae on Friday ratcheted up pressure on the National Assembly to hold a confirmation hearing for the justice minister nominee, frustrated by a political dogfight over the issue.
Cho Kuk, a law professor who served as senior presidential secretary for civil affairs, is at the center of intensifying bickering between ruling and major opposition parties.
Three weeks earlier, President Moon Jae-in nominated Cho to be the new justice minister amid his drive to reform the state prosecution.
Cho, however, has faced harsh political attacks and public condemnation over a host of scandals, including suspicions about his daughter’s entry into coveted schools in South Korea and dubious investment in a private equity fund (PEF) by Cho and his family members.
Political parties have agreed to open a two-day hearing next Monday but failed to reach a deal on details, including the list of witnesses.
The main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) says the nominee’s wife and other family members should testify in parliament as well.
The ruling Democratic Party is opposed to the call, stressing that it’s enough to give Cho an opportunity to explain the scandals.
You can read more at the link, but obviously the ruling party does not want Cho Kuk’s family members to testify because there is no way to explain away the alleged corruption involving his daughter.
This whole Cho Kuk nomination shows how committed the Moon administration is towards changing the ROK Constitution to make it easier to form a confederation with North Korea and allow President Moon to run for a second term. Moon’s close friend Cho Kuk becoming the Justice Minister is part of this strategy.
After his confirmation the next part of their strategy will be increasing their hold in the National Assembly in the 2020 elections to facilitate changing the ROK Constitution. This is why the Moon administration needs to continue to play the anti-Japan card and depending how things go with North Korea, we may even see the anti-US card played as well leading up to the election.
To be fair President Moon’s job approval rating is still pretty high considering all the scandals and poor economy:
Public sentiment toward President Moon Jae-in is becoming noticeably negative in light of various setbacks at home and abroad, with negative assessments of his job performance exceeding 50 percent, for the first time since he took office in May 2017, in a weekly Realmeter survey.
The survey published Monday showed that 50.4 percent of respondents thought Moon was doing a bad job in the third week of August, marking a 4.1 percent increase from the previous week. The pollster said the biggest reason for this was the escalating political row over one of his most trusted aides, Cho Kuk. The rival parties agreed to hold a two-day confirmation hearing from Sept. 2 for the justice minister nominee who is at the center of a widening scandal over allegations of corruption and unethical behavior involving himself and his family members.
Cho Kuk was a mber of Sanomaeng (Socialist Workers League of Korea). Its goal was to overthrow #SouthKorean system for workers' socialist revolution by armed uprising. Cho said he's not ashamed of it. Moon designated Cho to be the Justice Minister.https://t.co/uA6GW88ejv
Which have been greater: the anti-Abe or anti-Moon protests? I have heard there were massive anti-Moon demonstrations that the administration controlled broadcast media did not report. https://t.co/118yQUvhtZ
It is pretty clear that the Blue House is going to take the Kang Kyung-hwa approach to getting President Moon’s Justice Minister nominee approved:
Justice minister nominee Cho Kuk issues a statement on his family wealth on Friday. [YONHAP]
Cho Kuk promised Friday to donate all his family’s scandal-plagued wealth to society in an attempt to keep his justice minister nomination from being derailed.
Cho, however, remained silent about suspected academic fraud and other scandals surrounding his daughter, which have become the focus of public disquiet over his controversial nomination.
“My family and I have been loved by society, but I failed to have the humility to look back on myself,” Cho said in a press conference broadcast live Friday afternoon. He promised to quickly donate his family’s investments in a private equity fund and its ownership of a private school foundation to society at large.
Joong Ang Ilbo
You can read more at the link, but the current ROK Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-hwa had similar ethical issues as Cho and made face saving public statements like Cho is now making to get approved.
However, Cho’s ethical lapses are even worse than Kang’s:
He made clear, however, that he wouldn’t abandon his nomination to head the Ministry of Justice. “Please trust my sincerity and watch me till the end,” he said. “I will work with a humble attitude.”
Despite media reporting on suspicious wealth management, Cho insisted the family never used illegal means. While promising to donate the controversial family money and school foundation, Cho gave no explanation about any specific allegation.
After reading the brief statement about his family’s wealth, Cho ended the press conference without taking any questions. Conspicuously missing in his statement was any mention about the most volatile elements of the scandal surrounding his family, which involve his daughter.
Cho’s 28-year-old daughter, who currently attends Pusan National University’s Graduate School of Medicine, is suspected of having been wrongly cited as the first author of an English-language paper published in the Korean Journal of Pathology in 2008 and using that accomplishment to gain admission to Korea University in 2010.
The professor in charge of the controversial paper admitted Thursday that he had given special treatment to Cho’s daughter.
“She was responsible for experiments and editing of the paper,” Chang Young-pyo, a professor in the Department of Medical Science at Dankook University, told the JoongAng Ilbo on Thursday. “I was responsible for data analysis and writing the first draft of the paper. I cannot deny that a favor was given to her by crediting her as the first author.”
You can read more at the link, but ROK Heads may remember that one of the reasons former ROK President Park Geun-hye was impeached was because the daughter of her friend Choi Soon-sil, received special treatment to get admitted to college as well.
That is what Oh Young-jin writing for the Korea Times says people in South Korea are speculating about:
President Moon Jae-in receives a briefing on the National Security Office’s recommendation to scrap the Korea-Japan military intelligence-sharing agreement, Thursday. Yonhap
A look at the participants in the National Security Office meeting presided over by Chung Eui-yong, Moon’s top security aide, does not reveal these elements in play before the GSOMIA decision. But the movers and shakers that led the move were hidden in plain sight, as it was more the action of working-level presidential aides and others outside Cheong Wa Dae that have inherited Roh’s zeitgeist.
Some argue openly ― and more wonder ― whether the GSOMIA decision is aimed at diverting public attention from the scandal involving the justice minister-to-be regarding a mushrooming body of allegations of unethical, if not illegal, activities involving his daughter, himself and other family members. The revelations are shocking, dumb-founding and despicable to the point that his nomination deserves an immediate withdrawal.
But speculation appears quite plausible that Moon ditched the military pact to save his apostle, whom he depends on solely to achieve one of his key presidential agenda items ― reforming the prosecutors, an influential group notorious for colluding with power at a given time and thereby hindering the development of the nation’s democracy.
You can read more at the link, but the Justice Minister Nominee Cho Kuk is one of President Moon’s closest friends that he wants put in charge of the powerful Justice Ministry. It is ironic that President Moon came to power due to candlelight protests against the supposed corruption of the Park Geun-hye administration and Moon has done the same thing of appointing people with shady backgrounds to important positions in the government. The negative media is worth it because he trusts these people to forcibly advance his agenda.
Giving the media another bright shiny object to follow could have definitely been part of the timing of the GSOMIA calculus, but I feel they were going to withdraw regardless for a variety of reasons.
The Moon administration has decided that domestic politics is more important than national security:
South Korea’s Deputy National Security Adviser Kim Hyun-chong holds a press conference at Cheong Wa Dae on Aug. 23, 2019. (Yonhap)
South Korea consulted with the United States often and adequately on the fate of a bilateral pact with Japan on sharing military intelligence, Cheong Wa Dae said Friday, as Washington has voiced “strong concern” and “disappointment” over Seoul’s decision to discard the key tool for strengthening trilateral security cooperation in Northeast Asia.
“It’s true that the U.S. hoped for the extension of the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA),” South Korea’s Deputy National Security Adviser Kim Hyun-chong said in a press briefing.
Thus, he added, it was “natural” for Washington to be disappointed with Seoul’s move, which represents its toughest countermeasure yet against Tokyo’s export curbs.
You can read more at the link, but what allows the Moon administration to make this decision more easily than it should of, is that they know the U.S. will share with them any pertinent information the Japanese have on North Korea anyway.
This decision allows the Moon administration to show they are “doing something” in response to the trade dispute with Japan, burnish their anti-Japan street cred with the South Korean left, without really giving anything up in return.
It looks like another President Moon recommendation for a governmental position has a shady background:
Members of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party hold signs in protest of Cho Kuk’s nomination as justice minister during a meeting at the National Assembly, Wednesday. Yonhap
President Moon Jae-in is facing growing calls to withdraw his nomination of Cho Kuk as justice minister due to a widening scandal involving one of his most trusted aides.
The allegations of irregularities regarding his daughter’s academic history, in addition to the possible evasion of military service and the dual nationality of his son, who also holds U.S. citizenship, have produced a huge public backlash. A recent poll showed that almost 50 percent of respondents thought Cho was an inappropriate choice for justice minister.
Even some ruling party lawmakers have started to voice concerns about the impact of the Cho scandal on Moon’s leadership. “The people who supported Moon in the presidential election and our party are more actively raising questions about this issue,” Rep. Park Yong-jin of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) said in a radio interview, Wednesday. “If the nominee fails to give an explanation that is convincing to the public, the President will be faced with an inevitable decision.”
In particular, the younger generation of voters who have supported President Moon’s special focus on establishing a fair and just society, are feeling a sense of betrayal and expressing outrage on social media amid their own tough struggle to get into good schools and find stable jobs in the hyper competitive Korean society. Many angry citizens are questioning whether Cho is really the right choice to spearhead Moon’s cherished reform drive to promote transparency and fairness, the “core values” of the Moon administration, in the judiciary.
You can read more at the link, but Cho’s kids seem like they have the same shadiness following them that critics say is why President Moon is currently hiding his daughter overseas.
#SouthKorea's ruling party's think tank Institute for Democracy published a report stating not reaching an agreement w Japan is advantageous to the party in next year's election.https://t.co/G0yhvRg2ol
