Suspicion growing over Cheong Wa Dae's alleged election intervention
By Kim Jae-heun
Song Byung-gi
Suspicion is growing that Cheong Wa Dae intervened in last year's local elections in Ulsan with those involved giving statements that differ from the explanation offered by the presidential office.
In March last year, three months before the elections, the police launched an investigation into corruption allegations involving then Ulsan Mayor Kim Gi-hyeon's aides after receiving tip-off from the office of the presidential secretary for civil affairs. During the probe, Kim lost the election to Song Cheol-ho, a close friend of President Moon Jae-in. Later the aides were cleared of the allegations, and Kim claimed Cheong Wa Dae orchestrated the probe.
As rumors spread and controversy arose over who gave the tip-off to the police, presidential spokesperson Ko Min-jung said, Wednesday, that a staffer at the civil affairs office received information about the alleged corruption involving Kim's aides, and then the staffer reported this to his boss Baek Won-woo, former presidential secretary for civil affairs.
Ko added that Baek does not remember dealing with the case as it took place over two years ago, but it seems he passed it to the office of the presidential secretary for anti-corruption, which ultimately transmitted it to the police.
The spokesperson said the staffer obtained the tip-off from a retired public official he came to know at a camping site. She added the informant was not a member of a particular party.
However, Ko's briefing only backfired to bring stronger suspicion as the retired public official turned out to be Song Byung-gi, the incumbent Ulsan vice mayor for economic affairs.
Song Byung-gi is known to be a close aide to current Ulsan Mayor Song Cheol-ho. When the tip-off was made in October 2017, he held no public position but was working for the ruling Democratic Party of Korea member Song Cheol-ho's election campaign, and then Ulsan mayor Kim from the main opposition Liberty Korea Party was the main rival in the election.
Unlike Ko's explanation that Song Byung-gi had contacted the Cheong Wa Dae staffer first, he insisted that it was the government that initially reached out and requested his cooperation.
The vice mayor said in an interview with local media outlets that the government had asked him to “grasp various trends and notify them.” He said a “regional organization” collecting public opinion contacted him in the second half of 2017 to ask him several questions and he only told them what had already been revealed in the media.
“It is not true that I intended to affect the election when I provided the tip-off about former mayor Kim,” the vice mayor said in a press briefing, Thursday. He added his information was not confidential but was already spreading suspicion after a constructor involved in the corruption allegation filed a complaint with the Ulsan police.
Song said he came to know the Cheong Wa Dae staffer in late 2014 through a friend, and has met him on occasion with other friends.