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A majority of the presidential secretaries and administrative officials at Cheong Wa Dae who were hired during the final stage of the Roh Moo-hyun administration have yet to tender their resignations and are receiving their monthly salaries while doing no work. Not only that, some of these officials are even said to work at the election campaign offices of a particular political party. Among the 116 officials in special government service who had worked at the presidential office during the Roh administration, 106 received their salaries in March. Around W400 million (US$1=W976) in taxpayers¡¯ money has been spent on their salaries. Two of these officials are said to be working in the campaign offices of a United Democratic Party candidate for the National Assembly. There is no way of telling how many more of these people there are.
If the staff of the presidential office during the previous administration cannot find new jobs, a law enacted under presidential decree back in 1973 ensures they receive salaries for a year in the case of those holding regular civil servant status and three months of wages for those holding special government worker status. That may be the law, but until the Kim Dae-jung administration, officials who were part of the previous administration habitually tendered their resignations and underwent a vote of confidence. Officials hired during the Roh administration are acting as if nothing has happened.
It is simply unethical, not to mention a violation of the Election Law, for officials hired for special government service and having served as the closest aides to the former president to remain in their positions, get paid every month while they assist in the election campaigns of their political allies. They have some nerve.
These are the same officials who used the presidential helicopter on Memorial Day to fly their families to the Saemangum land reclamation site for picnics. This type of behavior is clearly nothing new for them, and they still don¡¯t care about the public.
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