Equestrian federation probe ends up empty-handed
By Kwon Mee-yoo
The government failed to find overwhelming evidence to prove the allegations that the Korea Equestrian Federation (KEF) extended special treatment to Chung Yoo-ra, a dressage competitor and daughter of Choi Soon-sil, President Park Geun-hye’s confidant and the center of the influence-peddling scandal.
An inspection by the sports ministry and the Korean Olympic Committee (KOC), aimed to look into suspicions regarding Chung’s acceptance onto the national team for the 2014 Asian Games and any special treatment given to her.
After the inspection, conducted from Nov. 23 to Dec. 7, the ministry said it would take disciplinary action against officials who issued fake documents and violated regulations, as well as Chung.
According to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, those who were responsible for selecting judges for the national team did not safeguard information on judges in charge of selection that was leaked to KEF officials.
However, the ministry failed to discover whether the judges were actually bribed to favor Chung because it does not have investigative rights.
The KEF is suspected of forging Chung’s training report while she was on the national team in 2014 and 2015. The federation also issued and sent fake documents to Chung’s high school requesting time for national team training, which did not occur.
The KEF pushed forward a major medium- to long-term project with a budget over 50.5 billion won ($43.1 million) sponsored by Samsung.
The roadmap included support for Chung’s participation in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. However, the ministry found that the project was not properly studied for feasibility by the KEF board of directors as a single executive promoted it alone.
The ministry said the prosecution had already taken related documents during a raid and the administrative audit centered on the violation of regulations to cooperate with an independent counsel.