Nam Hyun-woo has worked as a staff writer at The Korea Times since 2013, mostly covering business and politics. He currently belongs to the Business Desk where he covers topics such as emerging tech, AI, ICT and Korea's chaebol community. Prior to joining the team, he was the paper's correspondent for the presidential office of Korea during the Yoon Suk Yeol and Moon Jae-in administrations.
Rival parties exchange salvos over eyesight, family suspicions
People Power Party presidential candidate Yoon Suk-yeol speaks during a policy debate with taxi drivers in Songpa District, Seoul, Tuesday. Joint Press Corps
By Nam Hyun-woo
By Nam Hyun-woo
With less than a month remaining before the presidential election, the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) and the main opposition People Power Party (PPP) are still mounting political offensives against each other over suspicions concerning one candidate's military service exemption, and other allegations involving both candidates' family members.
According to the DPK, Wednesday, it has requested the Ministry of Justice to disclose information on PPP presidential candidate Yoon Suk-yeol's eyesight test administered when he was appointed as a prosecutor.
The request came after DPK Rep. Kim Byung-joo claimed, Monday, that Yoon could have dodged his mandatory military service unfairly, citing health records from 1982 saying Yoon could not serve due to a severe difference in the visual acuity between both his eyes.
All able-bodied Korean men must fulfill about two years of mandatory military service, but Yoon was exempted from this duty in 1982 because an eyesight test measured his left eye at 0.8 and his right eye at 0.1, a difference of 0.7. He has revealed that this difference remained the same in a 2019 eye test.
However, Rep. Kim claimed that the difference was down to 0.2 in 1994 and 0.3 in 2002, which are in the normal range, in eye tests conducted when Yoon was appointed as a prosecutor. Yoon first became a prosecutor in 1994 and quit in January 2002. After spending a year as a lawyer at the law firm Bae, Kim & Lee, he was reappointed as a prosecutor in 2003. The records of his 1994 and 2002 eye tests remain undisclosed.
“When he reached the age of military service, his eyesight difference was severe, and it returned to normal when he was prosecutor. And then it became severe again in 2019,” Kim said. “That is nearly impossible.”
Along with the questions about Yoon's eyesight, the DPK is amplifying suspicions that Yoon's mother-in-law engaged in real estate speculation.
DPK Rep. Kim Byung-kee said Tuesday that Yoon's mother-in-law, surnamed Choi, owns more than 628,000 square meters of real estate across the country with a combined value estimated to surpass 20 billion won ($16.73 million).
The DPK said Choi has already stood trial for manipulating documents while obtaining 529,000 square meters of land in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, and criticized the PPP for turning a blind eye to speculative real estate investments by the family members of the party's presidential candidate. Choi was acquitted in a high court on Jan. 25, and the prosecution appealed to the Supreme Court.
The moves are being interpreted as the DPK's attempts to divert public attention from the PPP's continued criticisms against DPK presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung's wife, Kim Hye-kyung. Kim faces allegations that she had ordered public officials at the Gyeonggi Provincial Government Office to run personal errands for her using the office's credit card in 2021, when her husband was Gyeonggi Province governor.
PPP Rep. Yoon Young-seok said Tuesday during a National Assembly meeting, “A secretary at Gyeonggi government office said that more than 90 percent of her job was running personal errands for Kim,” and that “Lee and Kim seem to have ruled the province as king and queen.”