By Kim Hyo-jin
The main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) proposed a bill, Monday, to set up an independent counsel to look into allegations that the prosecution and the National Intelligence Service (NIS) bribed politicians using “special activity funds.”
The bill, signed by 113 LKP lawmakers, intends to look deeper into how the special activity funds were used by the agencies in the previous and incumbent governments.
This comes as former presidential aides in the Park Geun-hye government and LKP lawmakers are in trouble over allegations they received illicit funds from the NIS.
Part of the agency’s budget has allegedly been doled out to the politicians and public officials under the name of “special activity funds.” Such funds were earmarked for classified activities and investigations.
Rep. Choi Kyung-hwan, a Park loyalist and former finance minister, is being investigated for his involvement in the scandal, based on testimony from former NIS director Lee Byung-kee.
The party has claimed the ongoing investigation is “biased,” calling for the need to set up an independent counsel team that can also investigate the prosecution’s bribery of the justice ministry.
In protest, it decided during a general meeting, Friday, to push for both a National Assembly probe and independent counsel looking into allegations regarding special activity funds.
“There is a serious question of fairness and neutrality over the current probe as the prosecution has only targeted figures from the Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye governments,” the party wrote in the bill.
Critics, however, view such a move as the party’s attempt to divert public attention from the bribery scandal and thwart the prosecution’s investigation of the figures from the Park government.
The party said it will ask the prosecution to stop its investigation until the independent counsel bill is put to a vote.
“We did not sponsor the bill for the interests of some individuals,” the party’s floor leader Rep. Chung Woo-taik said, dismissing the accusation. “We only requested an independent counsel team to discuss the overall issue of special activity funds.”
Despite the LKP’s determination, the prospect of the passage of the bill is slim. Not only the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) but also the third-largest People’s Party have negative views. The 116-member LKP falls short of a majority vote in the 299-seat National Assembly.
Political commentators say the LKP’s push for the bill reflects its uneasiness about losing ground in party politics while the Moon Jae-in government focuses on clearing up “deep-rooted social evils,” mainly targeting corruption and irregularities accumulated over the past decade during the Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye administrations.