[EDITORIAL] That Big Crowd Fooled Nobody

The government is being criticized for having mobilized large numbers of civil servants to welcome President Kim Dae-jung on his return to Korea from the Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony in Norway. Civil servants and ordinary citizens, including even primary schoolers, were similarly mustered when the president returned from the summit talks in North Korea in June. Such staged gatherings are reminiscent of the bad old authoritarian days.

Of course, the president's having won such a tremendous honor as the Nobel Peace Prize is something that merits congratulation. He certainly deserves to be welcomed and applauded for receiving worldwide recognition of his struggle for democratization and human rights and of his history-making initiative for rapprochement between North and South Korea. But when the "people's government" attempts to fool the public with methods used by military dictators of the past, it is retrogressive, undemocratic and a disgrace to the presidency.

More than 25,000 "welcomers" were assembled for the return from Pyongyang, and it is estimated that this time, over 15,000 were enlisted. Because of this, the quality of service at some government offices suffered and the government workers who took part were resentful at having been forced to do so. Can heartfelt congratulations possibly emerge from such a situation? With the economy in bad shape and the political arena in disarray, it is all the more important that government offices remain fully functional. But the administration assigned different departments responsibility for areas along the welcome route, and it is said that only a skeletal staff was left to carry on at City Hall and at ward offices.

It is appalling to think that someone in an administration that preaches globalization should have decided to stage these assemblies in such an outmoded way and even more dismaying to realize that apparently no one in the administration opposed welcoming home an honored president with such a dishonorable sham. Of course, some of those people may well have personally wanted to go out and welcome the president, but when the numbers of those mobilized by order exceeds 10,000, it looks suspiciously like a sycophantic effort on the part of high-level officials. Some may regard this as a trivial matter that does not deserve much attention. On the contrary, it could be used to set an excellent example of changing a bad old habit by finding out who was responsible for this at the top level and disciplining him.