The police and public broadcaster KBS are in a bitter tug-of-war over a reporter’s suspected bugging of the opposition Democratic Party.
Last Friday, police officers searched the journalist’s home and seized his laptop, mobile phone and portable recorder. The broadcaster angrily responded, saying the act ``insulted” KBS and ``infringed on” press freedom.
In a duel between a powerful state organ and a media outlet, one tends to side with the latter. Not in this case. In all likelihood, the public broadcaster is hiding something.
Instead of flatly denying the suspicions of eavesdropping by its employee ― and proving it ― KBS said he did not bug the office of DP Chairman Sohn Hak-kyu in the way the DP and the police allege (by, for instance, using a wireless microphone). DP officials testified the KBS reporter retrieved his cell phone that he (deliberately) left in Sohn’s room.
The KBS’s prove-it-if-you-can attitude cannot clear away the suspicion but only deepens it. Unfortunately for the nation’s largest TV station, the police seem quite confident of proving it. Otherwise, it wouldn’t have gone as far as a search and seizure, and the court wouldn’t have issued a warrant for it. Law enforcement officers will also likely revive erased content in the IT devices if there is any.
Bugging cannot be excused under any circumstances. This is why the laws call on even police officers and intelligence agents to get court approval in bugging for law enforcement and national security purposes. The court handed down sentences to two journalists at another public broadcaster MBC for wiretapping Samsung Group executives’ conversations on bribing politicians and prosecutors, saying it cannot forgive bugging even for the public purpose of reporting.
The KBS case belongs to neither. The DP’s closed-door meeting discussed its strategy in opposing the hike of subscription fees for what it sees as the one-sidedly pro-government broadcaster. That means the alleged bugging was not for national or public interest but for corporate interest. If the broadcaster were found to be involved in the illegal act, it would constitute a very grave violation of the law that can shake the foundation of media ethics. In that case, KBS is insulting the public, and narrowing the scope of press freedom.
By most appearances, the best way to minimize the damage for KBS is to lay bare what actually has happened and apologize to the public if necessary. The police, currently in another battle with the prosecution over investigative rights, will likely go all the way to prove these allegations. The more time the broadcaster takes to reveal the truth, the bigger the damage it w it suffer.
Rep. Han Sun-kyo, who first raised the stir by boasting he had the transcript of the eavesdropped material, and the ruling Grand National Party ought to tell about their part in the snowballing scandal. A fence should take as much responsibility, at least morally, as a thief.
Halfway across the globe, a tabloid paper with more than a hundred years of history was forced to shut down for illegal hacking, throwing a top political leader into the biggest career crisis for possible condoning it.
We hope the ongoing scandal here would not develop into another case of politics-media collusion for power and money.