Ex-top Seoul educator put behind bars

By Kim Rahn

Kwak No-hyun, Seoul’s former top educator, criticized the Supreme Court’s upholding a guilty verdict on him for bribery as “going against the stream of public education reform.”

The former superintendent of the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education was put behind bars on Friday for bribing a rival candidate in return for the latter’s withdrawal from the 2010 election for the post.

He lost his job following the ruling.

“The court decision is a pathetic, meaningless countercurrent against reform,” the 58-year-old said in a press conference in front of the Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office in southern Seoul before heading to the Seoul Detention Center.

He was sentenced to one year in prison on charges of giving 200 million won to the rival, former Seoul National University of Education professor Park Myoung-gee, after the election. Kwak claimed he offered the money out of goodwill as Park was suffering from financial difficulties from the election expenses.

“I believe a majority of the public would have made the same decision as me if they had known Park’s financial status and mental exhaustion. I think the rulings by the first, appellate and top courts were inhumane,” he said.

“I’ll be an inmate, but the prison term will not be a pain. It will give me hope because I believe it will ignite educational and judicial reform, and democracy.”

While he was sentenced to one year in prison, he will serve eight months because he had already served four months after the district court’s ruling last year. He was released after the appellate court handed down a fine without a jail term.

In the meantime, civic groups supporting Kwak held a press conference in front of the Constitutional Court in central Seoul to demand it hasten a decision on a petition Kwak filed about the Election Law clause which held him accountable. Kwak asked the court to review whether the clause, which defines giving money after the election as an act of bribery, was constitutional.