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Ex-agriculture minister speaks out in new book

Published: 04 Sep. 2009, 21:59

Chung Woon-chun

As a major government figure who played a part in the controversial decision to resume imports of U.S. beef last summer, former Agriculture Minister Chung Woon-chun might have a lot to say on the matter.

The public outcry around the issue, which took the form of the nation’s largest rallies in a decade, was an expression of both the fear of mad cow disease and resistance to the unilateral decision made by the government. The policy eventually led to the demise of Chung’s political career: He resigned last August, after just six months on the job, to take responsibility for the government’s handling of the issue.

In his new book, “Bakbihyang,” released Thursday, the former minister finally talks about the decision.

Bakbihyang is a three-character Chinese word that is part of a 14-letter verse of a poem written in the Tang Dynasty in China. The poem says that a Chinese plum flower would not have the same pleasing fragrance without weathering the piercing cold. The comparison Chung makes to himself and his family is clear.

In the book, he recalls the agony his family suffered at the height of the public discontent with the government and himself in particular.

“One morning, I went into my 16-year-old daughter’s room and found her asleep at her desk. Her face was stained by tears. Her computer monitor showed a piece written by someone on a portal saying, ‘If Chung Woon-chun doesn’t kill himself, let’s give him the death penalty.’”

In the book, Chung unleashes his criticism of the crew of MBC’s “PD Diary,” an investigative TV program. The program’s episode that aired April 29, 2008, triggered a series of candlelight vigils across the nation against U.S. beef imports. According to the producers, that episode was aimed at raising awareness of the risks of the human form of mad cow disease. But critics and the government said it exaggerated the risks of eating American beef. Chung filed a libel suit against the PD Diary producers in March.

He reveals his motivations for his actions against MBC in the book, writing, “I wanted to verify what was right and wrong, and make this incident a lesson for the public.”

Chung also urged the PD Diary production crew to be courageous and admit their wrongdoing. Responsibility is no less a requirement than the freedom of the press, he writes.

One anecdote he recounts in the book involves Chung Un-chan, the former Seoul National University president who was named as prime minister on Thursday. Because the men’s names are similar, they are easily confused. But as public opinion against the former agriculture minister grew, people posted a flurry of negative comments against the SNU professor on the Internet. Chung Woon-chun sent him a letter of apology, to which he received the response “nevermind.”

“The incident has increased public recognition of me,” Chung Un-chan was quoted as saying by Chung Woon-chun in the book.

By Moon Gwang-lip [[email protected]]