By Na Jeong-ju
Staff Reporter
Vice Health Minister Lee Bong-hwa offered to resign Monday for her application for a rice subsidy this year amid growing allegations that many senior officials and lawmakers have abused the subsidy system.
Lee applied for the subsidy for a paddy located in Anseong, Gyeonggi Province, but withdrew her application after the media questioned her eligibility.
President Lee Myung-bak will accept her resignation, Cheong Wa Dae said.
``The situation was really regrettable,’’ the President was quoted as saying by his spokesman Lee Dong-kwan. ``I hope this case will serve as a wake-up call for all officials and help start efforts to fix the flawed system.’’
Vice Minister Lee had faced growing pressure to resign not only from the governing Grand National Party (GNP) but from opposition parties. She was one of the senior government officials who allegedly abused the subsidy system, launched under former President Roh Moo-hyun in 2005 to support low-income rice farmers.
Rep. Kim Woo-nam of the main opposition Democratic Party (DP) claimed a total of 169 of 816 high-ranking officials of the Lee administration own rice paddies, citing a government report. Among them are Prime Minister Han Seung-soo, Board of Audit and Inspection Chairman Kim Hwang-shik, Strategy and Finance Minister Kang Man-soo and Korea Communications Commission Chairman Choi See-joong, according to the lawmaker.
Observers say many paddy owners took the subsidies, although they never engaged in farming, to seek exemptions from capital gains taxes on their land. Under the current law, individuals must farm their land for at least eight years to enjoy exemptions when they sell the property. Those receiving subsidies are regarded as actual rice growers by the tax office.
In the morning, the GNP accepted a proposal from opposition parties for a National Assembly investigation into the scandal.
The parties, however, differed on how the investigation should proceed and who should be called in for questioning, dimming the prospects for a thorough and non-partisan scrutiny.
``This morning, Chairman Park Hee-tae and the GNP’s decision-making Supreme Council agreed on the launch of a parliamentary investigation into the scandal,’’ said Rep. Huh Tae-yeol, a council member. ``Parties will discuss details of the investigation, but there are core differences among them that can interrupt its progress.’’
The decision came after the DP agreed to cooperate for the passage of the government’s pump-priming measures aimed at rescuing financial firms from the worst-ever global crisis since the Great Depression, and boosting economic growth.
The scandal has made headlines since Vice Minister Lee was found early this month to have applied for the rice subsidy. The owners of rice paddies can receive subsidies only when they actually produce rice, otherwise the money should be given to tenant farmers who actually grow the rice.
Three incumbent GNP lawmakers _ Kim Sung-hoi, Kim Hak-yong and Lim Dong-kyu _ and Rep. Kwon Sun-taik, floor leader of the minor opposition Liberty Forward Party, admitted to having received the subsidies. Also under suspicion are tens of senior incumbent officials of the Lee administration and 170,000 civil servants, public company workers and their family members.
The scandal took a twist last week when GNP lawmakers alleged former President Roh was aware of the abuse of the subsidy system in June last year, but instructed officials to keep it secret from the public to prevent a public backlash ahead of the presidential election in December.