Rep. Moon Dae-sung's reinstatement hits snag

Members of the ruling Saenuri Party’s Busan Saha-A district hold a rally in Yeouido, Monday to protest Rep. Moon Dae-sung rejoining the ruling party. / Yonhap

By Jun Ji-hye

Rep. Moon Dae-sung

About 130 Busan residents protested at the main office of the ruling Saenuri Party in Yeouido, Monday, after the party moved to allow Rep. Moon Dae-sung to rejoin it.

Moon was elected in April 2012 to represent Busan’s Saha-A district, but kicked out of the ruling party after he was alleged to have plagiarized his doctorate thesis at Kookmin University.

The protestors, ruling party members of the Saha district, delivered a written protest to Rep. Hong Moon-jong, the party’s secretary general, who said he intended to press ahead with Moon’s request to have his party membership reinstated.

Moon was also the subject of an internal investigation by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) of which he is an athlete member until 2016. He won a gold medal in taekwondo at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games.

“The controversy surrounding Moon’s thesis has yet to be resolved,” the protestors claimed. “Moon didn’t do much for his constituents, keeping himself incommunicado.”

Hong sided with the first-term lawmaker, saying the IOC has dropped its ethics probe of Moon.

“The IOC has said it will no longer call Moon’s plagiarism allegations into question. Kookmin University is not raising any question either,” said Hong during a recent radio interview. “There have been requests from his constituency as well,” he said.

The protestors rapped Hong for ignoring their complaints, saying Moon’s reinstatement may lead the party to lose the Busan mayoral election.

They accused Hong of making misleading statements related to the IOC decision.

In December, the IOC ethics committee closed its inquiry because Kookmin University refused to provide related documents that concluded Moon had committed plagiarism.

The IOC added it could resume its investigation if and when the case merited it.

The governing party tried to move on Moon’s reinstatement at a Supreme Council meeting last week, but failed to reach a consensus.