Jeongsu foundation's office raided
An investigator inspects surveillance camera recordings during a raid on the office of the Jeongsu Scholarship Foundation in Jeong-dong, central Seoul, Friday. / Yonhap
By Na Jeong-ju
Prosecutors raided the office of the Jeongsu Scholarship Foundation at the center of a controversy due to its connection to ruling Saenuri Party presidential candidate Rep. Park Geun-hye, Friday.
The raid followed media reports that the foundation allegedly attempted to support Park’s campaign by donating illegal funds.
The National Union of Mediaworkers earlier filed a complaint with the prosecution to demand a full-fledged investigation into the suspicions.
The scholarship foundation, headed by Park for 10 years until 2005, has a 100-percent stake in the Busan Daily and a 30-percent stake in public broadcaster MBC.
Liberal daily the Hankyoreh reported in early October that the foundation’s current chief, Philip Choi, met with MBC executives to discuss a secret plan to sell its stake in the broadcaster. The report triggered speculation that the foundation had attempted to donate the money from the stake sale to Park.
The newspaper made public a transcript of a conversation between Choi and one of the executives, Lee Jin-sook.
The foundation and MBC have flatly denied the allegations. The broadcaster sued a Hankyoreh journalist last week for eavesdropping.
Through the raid, prosecutors secured recordings of surveillance cameras and other material that “can shed light on the allegations surrounding the foundation,” an investigator told reporters.
The foundation is also known to have attempted to sell the Busan Daily despite a court injunction banning that action. Unionists of the newspaper have walked out in protest of the attempt and the foundation’s alleged intervention in its editorial policy.
As the controversy deepens, Park’s aides have called on Choi to step down as chairman out of concern that the case could deal a blow to the Saenuri Party candidate’s campaign.
Choi is known to be a long-time supporter of Park but has refused to quit, claiming that the foundation has no longer has anything to do with her.
The foundation was created in the 1950s by Busan-based businessman Kim Jie-tae but the administration of Park Chung-hee, the Saenuri Party candidate’s father, forcibly took it over in 1962.