Warrant Sought for Roh’s Ex-Aide
By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter
The prosecution requested an arrest warrant for one of President Roh Moo-hyun's confidants, Wednesday, on charges of bribery and influence-peddling, the Busan District Prosecutor’s Office said.
Jeong Yoon-jae, 43, the former protocol secretary to President Roh, is suspected of receiving bribes from Kim Sang-jin, 42, a building contractor, in return for helping Kim win contracts for large-scale construction projects as well as a tax reduction through Chung Sang-gon, 53, a former regional tax office chief.
``Jeong is denying the allegations, but we requested the warrant after collecting evidence and statements from the people involved,’’ a prosecutor said.
Jeong has flatly denied all suspicions saying, ``I don’t know who Kim is trying to cover by making such malicious statements, but I disagree with the prosecutors’ allegations.’’ The court will decide whether to issue the arrest warrant by Thursday, according to the prosecution.
The corruption scandal emerged in July when Kim was arrested on charges of embezzling 44.2 billion won worth of funding for a redevelopment project. Kim has already admitted having given a 100 million won bribe to the former head of the Busan tax office in order to avoid an audit at a dinner last summer arranged by Jeong. The former tax chief was arrested on charges of accepting the alleged bribe.
Jeong resigned last month from his secretarial position after the scandal emerged. However, he said his resignation was planned beforehand and was not connected to the allegations against him. President Roh has said it was inappropriate for his former secretary to have been at the scene of a bribery exchange, but he would wait for the investigation result and is ready to apologize if Jung is found guilty.
Meanwhile, a top officer of the National Tax Service (NTS) allegedly asked the prosecution to stop investigating the corruption scandal, the daily Dong-A Ilbo reported, Wednesday. According to the report, Jeon Goon-pyo, commissioner of the NTS, requested the prosecution to cease the investigation on the use of the 100 million won, the bribe offered to the former Busan tax chief by Kim.
The commissioner made the request to an investigation team which visited the NTS building in Seoul on Sept. 12 to collect data from the Real Estate Taxation Bureau where Chung worked before he was arrested.
Also, the prosecutors found that the tax officer called the commissioner twice on Aug. 8 and Aug. 9 before he was sent to jail and they are reviewing the conversation the two had and whether Chung provided money to other higher figures in the NTS.
However, the tax office denied the report. Regarding the top officer’s request to stop the investigation into the use of the bribe, it said the head officer just expressed his hope that the scandal would end soon because continuing news reports defame the tax office. As for telephone conversation, the office said it was the responsibility of a subordinate to report to his superior what was happening to him.