By Lee Tae-hoon
The main opposition party ratcheted up the pressure on the ruling party and prosecution Tuesday over the ongoing controversy and probe into a cash-for-candidacy scandal involving two ruling party members.
Lawmakers of the Democratic United Party (DUP) even raised the allegation that prosecutors are colluding with the governing Saenuri Party in an attempt to minimize the negative fallout on Rep. Park Geun-hye, the leading presidential candidate for the ruling party.
The scandal erupted after the National Election Commission (NEC) alleged last week that Hyun Ki-hwan, then a lawmaker and member of the party's nomination committee, received 300 million won ($265,000) from Rep. Hyun Young-hee in return for a proportional representative seat ahead of April's general elections.
Rep. Park Ki-choon, spokesman of the DUP, said that prosecutors appeared to be offering a chance for two disgraced Saenuri Party members to destroy evidence by intentionally leaking misleading information to the media.
He alleged that the prosecutors have diverted the attention by wrongfully claiming that a third person tricked Rep. Hyun into pocketing the bribe for his own use.
Park also claimed that the NEC tried to cover up its findings that Rep. Hyun won a proportional representative seat by bribing the former legislator Hyun due to fears that it would negatively impact the governing party.
The DUP officials assert that Rep. Park Geun-hye, the then head of the Saenuri Party, should take full responsibility for the fiasco, rather than Hwang Woo-yeo, the incumbent chairman of the conservative party.
They say that Rep. Hwang is trying to take the blame for safeguarding Rep. Park, for whom he has stayed faithful in the lead up to gaining the party’s top post.
They claim that senior Cheong Wa Dae and Saenuri Party officials have been trying to exercise undue influence to block the progress of the prosecution’s investigation into the cash-for-candidacy scandal.