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The Roh Moo-hyun government is in trouble just three months into its term. It has allowed itself to become engulfed in major national issues, such as the Saemangeum land reclamation project, the truckers' strike, the suspicious leadership of the nation's intelligence agency, the Hanchongryun issue and the privatization of public companies.
One major problem is a lack of coordination within the government. Another is that ministers aren't sure whether they are spokesmen for interest groups or administrators. For instance, Environment Minister Han Myung-sook and Fisheries Minister Huh Sung-kwan recently visited and encouraged a couple religious leaders who are carrying out an elaborate protest against the land reclamation project. Then a few days later Agriculture Minister Kim Young-jin said that the project should go forward.
More confusion has been caused by the government's mishandling of the new school information system, or the NEIS. The Education Ministry had said it would respect the recommendation by the Human Rights Commission that the system be scrapped, but later changed its mind.
The controversy over the banned student group Hanchongryun reached a discordant point where the Supreme Court confirmed that it was an anti-state organization while elements of the government were pushing to legalize it. According to the ruling Millennium Democratic Party, there are 19 such "major controversies" in which internal fights are expected to expose more lack of coordination in the government.
The fundamental problem is that the ministers who should be coordinators of the country's issues are acting as representatives of interest groups. A Millennium Democrat lawmaker, Kang Woon-tae, referred to this year's strike at Doosan Heavy recently when he said the government should not intervene at strike sites or persuade management on behalf of union members. The deputy head of the Federation of Korean Industries, Cho Nam-hong, said that Roh's government had raised excessive expectations for many people who consider themselves the weaker in society.
Kim Yong-rae, a former minister of government affairs, said the government should place more experienced people in the cabinet, thereby maintaining a balance. Choi In-ki, former minister of home affairs, said there should be a firm principle at work in implementing and enforcing the law.
(Choi Byung-mook, bmchoi@chosun.com )
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