By Kim Rahn
“The whole country is corrupt” ― this is how professors define the year of 2012, following a series of corruption scandals involving politicians, government officials and even prosecutors.
A professors’ journal said Sunday that a majority of its 626 members selected the four-symbol Chinese phrase “Geosegaetak” (擧世皆濁) as an idiom describing this year.
The phrase means that the whole nation is corrupt and nobody is upright regardless of ranking.
It came from a story written by Gurwon, a government official from an ancient Chinese nation: Deprived of his post after being entrapped, Gurwon was walking along the river, thin-faced. A fisherman recognized him and asked what had happened, Gurwon then said, “The country was corrupt but I alone was not. All the people were drunk but I alone was in sobriety. So I was kicked out.”
Hanshin University professor Yoon Pyung-joong, who suggested the phrase, said that even intellectuals, who are supposed to make upright opinions, make partisan comments while participating in politics.
“The government is not playing a public role and public officials have been getting seriously corrupt in the Lee Myung-bak administration. But there is no easy solution,” he said.
Professor Han Sang-hie of Konkuk University’s law school said, “At the end of the Lee administration, ethics collapsed and corruption prevailed. The prosecution and the court abused the law and ridiculed justice, while the President was an incarnation of greed as seen in the retirement residence case,” Han said.
The cases Han referred to include senior prosecutor Kim Kwang-joon’s receiving 1 billion won in kickbacks and the first family’s suspicious property deal for a retirement home for President Lee, for which a special counsel concluded his son evaded gift taxes.
Kangwon National University professor Park Sang-kyu said, “At election time, some intellectuals pose as representatives of specific candidates and employ sophistry only for the sake of winning the election. That confuses citizens.”