The court should be born again

Judicial reform is needed more than ever to end the politicization of the court and uphold its independence.

Chung Yong-sangThe author is a professor of law at Dongguk University College of Law and former president of the Korea Law Professors Association.

The Democratic Party (DP)’s refusal to accept the nomination of a senior judge as the Supreme Court Chief Justice has thrust the judiciary into a long vacuum without its chief. Last Friday, the majority opposition voted down a motion to endorse Lee Gyun-ryong, a senior judge at the Seoul High Court, as chief justice. This kind of rejection is the first in 35 years. Earlier, a liberal judge at the Seoul Central District Court rejected the prosecution’s request for an arrest warrant for DP leader Lee Jae-myung for a further investigation into his alleged corruption.

As many as 24 suspects were already arrested for their potential involvement in the two suspicious redevelopment projects approved by the DP leader when he was Seongnam mayor, and the mysterious remittance of $8 million to North Korea when he was Gyeonggi governor. The progressive judge’s rejection of Lee’s arrest warrant under such circumstances is unfathomable. I can hardly dispel the suspicion that the judge’s decision could be an offshoot of the “politicization of the judiciary,” a reasonable characterization of the Supreme Court led by former Chief Justice Kim Myeong-su for six years. The rejection of the arrest warrant by one of his disciples will most likely deepen public distrust in the judiciary.

After rejecting the request for the arrest warrant, Yoo Chang-hoon, the judge at the Seoul Central District Court, said that the prosecution cannot detain him only based on circumstantial evidence. Really? Given the overwhelming weight of Lee’s apparent criminality in the whole scam, the judge’s decision prompts a serious question about fairness — more specifically, the equilibrium between legal benefits and criminal penalty. It could be better if the court leaves the decision on arrest warrants to a group of judges, not to a single judge, when it concerns a case with strong social repercussions.

Despite political disputes, it would have been the best if the prosecution had indicted Lee swiftly and the court had proceeded trials fast. But their protraction made the case look like a political issue, not a criminal one. A political black hole that sucks all other important issues is neither desirable nor normal.

Undoubtedly, the independence and neutrality of the court under the helm of the former chief justice was greatly shaken during the Moon Jae-in administration. After judges handed down one biased ruling after another during the six years under Kim’s reign, public respect for the judiciary branch hit rock bottom. The court’s arbitrary protraction on many corruption cases — involving former Justice Minister Cho Kuk, Rep. Yoon Mee-hyang, and the Blue House’s alleged intervention in the Ulsan mayoral election, for instance — reflected a critical lack of protection for people’s rights and damaged the integrity of the judiciary.

Law and order are in chaos after political circles methodically drove out what’s legal and legitimate from society — to the extent that it is difficult to tell whether it’s the rule of law or the rule by law. Serious side effects resulted from the mammoth opposition’s tyrannical operation of the National Assembly. Just lust look at a series of anti-Constitutional bills, including one banning the dispatch of anti-North Korea leaflets across the border, not to mention the repeated motions demanding resignations of Cabinet ministers and the abuse of the DP’s signature impeachment card.

Politicians must always use legitimate procedures and means to achieve their goals. Laws can be executed by the power of the state, but if they are subjugated to political power, it will only fuel public distrust in politics, which in turn deepens skepticism about laws.

The phenomenon of today’s politics going beyond laws or reigning over them sounds loud alarms. Lawmakers must not make light of laws and enact irrational laws. The rush to legislate what the majority party wants — in a unilateral and arbitrary way — is not normal. In such a world, justice cannot prevail. Our politicians must not make laws surrender to their politics or enact malicious laws to shake the rule of law.

The court must do its best to safeguard the rights of the people through swift trials. If the judiciary continues delaying trials in fear of the reaction from the powers that be, and if judges help deepen the public distrust in the bench through nonsensical rulings based on their ideology, not on their conscience, it goes against the Constitution.

Judicial reform is needed more than ever to end the politicization of the court and uphold its independence. The court must be born again. It must abandon the legacy of the former chief justice and recover its integrity. If the lawmakers ignore the public call, the voters will judge them in next year’s parliamentary elections.

Translation by the Korea JoongAng Daily staff.