It took a little bit in a roundabout way (roundhouse way?), but NFP finally managed to push out two new Assembly members. Kim Hyeong-Tae, former press secretary of Park Geun-Hye who won the Ulsan Buk-gu seat, allegedly attempted to sexually assault his sister-in-law, who was married to his dead younger brother. Moon Dae-Seong, a former Olympic gold medalist in Taekwondo who won the Busan Saha-gu 1 seat, plagiarized more than 1/3 of his Ph.D. thesis word-for-word. Neither of them belongs to the NFP any longer.
Moon’s saga was particularly comical, as he was all but ready to give a press conference announcing his exit from the NFP, only to do an about-face minutes before the press conference after receiving a mysterious phone call. But once the Kookmin University, which awarded Moon the Ph.D., gave an official report stating that Moon plagiarized his thesis, it was all over for him.
Regardless of the course it took, I am still impressed by NFP’s willingness to ditch its majority status to disassociate itself with disreputable characters. UPP’s Roh Hoe-Chan said it the best: “NFP is cutting to its bone, while the progressives are getting a body scrub.“
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If I were an enterprising Korean journalist, I would research all the publications and theses of all the Korean national politicians, elected and appointed.
Thar’s journalistic gold in them thar papers.
^ Yup, that has been happening so far. There are at least three new Assembly members who likely plagiarized their papers, with more to come.
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