Lee Jin-sook: “It seems like the staff is being tortured, so come out”
Choi Min-hee: “Is the Standing Committee a Torture Room?”
“(At the first hearing) I saw that even the director of the Korea Communications Commission, including the head of the office, was called out and questioned on issues that they could not answer, which was like being tortured.” (Lee Jin-sook, Chairperson of the Korea Communications Commission)
“Turn off the microphone. Are you comparing the sacred National Assembly Standing Committee conference room to a torture chamber?” (Minhee Choi, Chairperson of the Science, Technology, Information, Broadcasting and Communications Committee of the Democratic Party of Korea)
On the 14th, at the 2nd hearing on the broadcasting control, including the appointment of Director Bang Moon-jin, held by the National Assembly’s Science and Technology Committee, Chairman Lee and opposition party members clashed head-on. Chairman Lee said to the Democratic Party, who had called him as a witness, “What I felt (at the hearing) was that the saying ‘All animals are equal. Some animals are more equal’ came to mind.” Chairman Lee, who has been suspended from his duties since the impeachment motion led by the Democratic Party passed on the 2nd, did not attend the first hearing, citing hospitalization as the reason. Chairman Choi objected, saying, “It’s a story from the novel ‘Animal Farm.’ Are you saying that the National Assembly is now an animal farm?”
While the hearing that day was filled with shouting and clashing over each other’s questions and answers, there were also criticisms that the truth about the process by which the seven directors of the Korea Broadcasting Culture Promotion Association (KBS), the largest shareholder of MBC, and six directors of the Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) were appointed by the “two-person system” of Chairman Lee and Acting Chairman of the Korea Communications Commission Kim Tae-gyu was not properly investigated.
After taking the oath as a witness that afternoon, the chairman submitted the oath to Chairman Choi and went to his seat without greeting him, receiving protests from the opposition party. In response to questions from the ruling and opposition party lawmakers regarding the appointment of the director, the chairman responded, “I am in the middle of an impeachment trial, and I do not think it is appropriate to talk about my duties.” In response to the opposition party’s claim that “there was an order from above,” the chairman refuted the claim, saying, “As a witness, it is extremely insulting to say that I received the order from somewhere.”
In the morning, there was a war of words between Acting Chairman Kim and the opposition party members. When Chairman Choi pointed out that “when answering, he crosses his arms and laughs at questions or rubs his face,” Acting Chairman Kim responded, “What do you mean by rubbing his face? I won’t cross my arms.” The opposition party voted to indict Acting Chairman Kim for refusing to answer.
Democratic Party lawmaker Noh Jong-myeon asked acting director Kim, “KBS, tell me who Director Bang Moon-jin is.” Acting director Kim responded, “Isn’t this a place to test your memory?” When Noh raised his voice, acting director Kim said, “I can hear you well, so you don’t have to raise your voice.” Noh responded, “I’ll adjust the tone. Don’t be so arrogant.”
The ruling and opposition parties also engaged in a war of words over the fact that the Korea Communications Commission reviewed 83 candidates for director in just one and a half hours. When the opposition party claimed that “they conducted a military operation-like coup to take control of broadcasting” by saying that “each person was reviewed for 42 seconds,” Shin Sung-beom, a member of the People Power Party, countered, “The previous government did the same.”
Reporter Kim Seong-mo [email protected]
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2024-08-15 10:45:44