 |
| Justice Party chairman Kim Jong-cheol speaks during a New Year press conference at the National Assembly in Yeouido, Seoul. Jan. 20. He was expelled and stripped of his party membership for sexually harassing a fellow lawmaker on Jan. 15. It was the first time the head of an established political party was removed due to sexual misconduct. Yonhap |
By Yi Whan-woo
The latest sexual harassment allegations involving former Justice Party Chairman Kim Jong-cheol raise questions over why sexual violence is being repeated in politics, despite campaigns to prevent it.
Last month, Kim admitted to sexually harassing Jang Hye-young, a female lawmaker, after having dinner together on Jan. 15. He was dismissed from his leadership post and stripped of his party membership.
Kim joins former Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon, ex-Busan Mayor Oh Keo-don and former South Chungcheong Province Governor Ahn Hee-jung. Park and Oh sexually harassed their respective female subordinates and Ahn raped his secretary.
Park committed suicide in July 2020 after police received a complaint from the victim. Oh faces a trial after allegations against him surfaced in April 2020. Ahn is currently serving a three-and-half-year prison term after being convicted of sexual assault in 2019.
Some attributed the continuing prevalence of sexual misconduct by high-ranking civil servants and politicians to the fact that the parliament and government are male-dominated.
"It is a problem that the National Assembly is composed primarily of men in their 50s who therefore have influence on parliamentary culture as well as power," Park Seong-min, a member of the Supreme Council of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), said in a radio interview. "Their level of sensitivity toward gender issues certainly falls behind that of younger generations. They fail to understand deeply the purpose of measures that are aimed at preventing sexual offenses and act accordingly."
A National Assembly administrative staffer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the male-dominated leadership of major political parties causes "gender inequality" that can lead to sexual offenses.
"For instance, a female lawmaker will need to win favors from the leadership if she wants to extend her term and secure her candidacy for the next Assembly election," the staffer said. "The lawmaker may act in a submissive manner, which will be misunderstood by male leaders as a tacit approval to exploit her and still go unpunished."
 |
| Former Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon committed suicide in July 2020 after sexual misconduct allegations surfaced. Yonhap |
 |
| Former Busan Mayor Oh Keo-don stepped down in April 2020 over sexual misconduct allegations. He admitted his wrongdoings and faces trial. Yonhap |
 |
| Former South Chungcheong Province Governor Ahn Hee-jung is serving a three-and-half-year jail term after being convicted of raping his secretary in 2019. Yonhap |
Hwang Tae-soon, a political commentator, said the liberals appear to have grown "morally lax after seizing power," noting that Park, Oh and Ahn were all from the DPK, while Kim's Justice Party is a minor progressive party.
"The cases of Park and Kim in particular explain this point, considering that the former gained a reputation for being a women's rights lawyer before becoming a politician, and that the Justice Party has been an ardent critic of sexual misconduct committed by politicians and high-ranking officials," Hwang said.
Shin Yul, a political science professor at Myongji University, said the DPK contributed to lax moral standards in the cases of Park and Oh, by fielding candidates for the Seoul and Busan mayoral by-elections to replace them.
Fielding candidates for the two cities went against an internal DPK regulation that prohibited the party from having its members run in a by-election which takes place due to a party member resigning over their own wrongdoing. But the DPK simply changed the regulation to be able to field candidates in the by-elections.
Another political commentator, Yu Chang-seon, said, anyone can be a perpetrator of a sex crime.
"For instance, conservative politicians usually made the headlines for sexual misconduct allegations in the past," he said. "This fact suggests that anyone, conservative or liberal, can commit sexual offenses when they have power."
Justice Party Rep. Jang, who was the victim of sexual harassment by its former head, said, "Anyone can become the perpetrator of sexual violence the moment they fail to treat a fellow citizen with the dignity they deserve.
"We need to figure out why even seemingly respectable men repeatedly, and so horribly, fail to treat women around them with dignity," she added.
Experts said the #MeToo movement prompted Korean women to stop tolerating sexual offenses, which has led to an increase in sexual offenses cases being reported to the police or women's rights groups.
Meanwhile, experts and politicians said the action taken by the Justice Party after Kim's sexual harassment case can serve as a precedent in preventing such cases from happening again.
Major political parties in the past sought to cover up such incidents and allegedly defended perpetrators. But the Justice Party carried out an internal investigation, revealed the results to the public and meted out the heaviest penalty that could have been imposed on a party member by expelling Kim.
This was the first time that the head of an established political party has been removed due to sexual misconduct.
In a statement, the Justice Party said it "discussed the matter with gravity and swiftly reached a decision, given the severity of an incident of misconduct having been carried out by none other than the party leader himself."
"The Justice Party should be applauded for its prompt action, despite the fact that Kim's case tarnished its reputation as the champion of women's rights issues," Shin said.
Park Seong-min of the DPK said the Justice Party's measures "offer a lesson for our party."
"There were apparently regrettable aspects in the past when the DPK was in a similar situation. The party will need to make a lot more efforts, as the Justice Party did, in fighting against sexual violence," she said.
