Military regime barred students with activism record from gov't jobs

SEOUL, Dec. 10 (Yonhap) -- The military government of the early 1980s barred
students with a record of political activism from working in the government,
deliberately rejecting those who passed written exams in final interviews,
investigators said Wednesday.
The state-run Truth and Reconciliation Commission confirmed long-held suspicions
that the Chun Doo-hwan government had blocked the employment of students critical
of his rule. The army general took power through a coup in 1980.
Five students were eliminated in the yearly tests in 1980 and 1981 because of
their previous dissident activities, the investigative commission said. One of
them committed suicide in 1982 after failing the test twice, it said.
Under a government directive, officials "drew up the names of students who had
been involved in activism after a background check with the Agency for National
Security Planning and marked them with a red line among the list of
interviewees," the commission quoted one of the officials as saying during their
investigation.
Another witness who graded applicants in the final interview for the 1981 test
also testified that senior-level officials "visited the interviewers and told
them to take the list into consideration when making assessments," the commission
said in a statement.
"It's late, but better than never," Baik Jong-sup, one of the five rejected
students and currently an administration professor of Daejeon University, said.
"Even if an acceptance certificate is given to me now, I wouldn't be able to use
it, but I'd really like to have it in my hand."
Park Mun-hwa, a graduate student at Kyungpook National University, took his own
life at age 24, frustrated by his two consecutive failures in the final
interviews.
The commission said such power abuse amounts to "a grave violation of human
rights by the government" and recommended it apologize to the victims and
withdraw its failure notices.
Investigators earlier confirmed activist students were disqualified in the bar
exam during the military rule. Six applicants, including one who is now a ruling
party lawmaker, Chung Chin-sup, failed in final interviews because of their
records of activism, they found. The Ministry of Justice belatedly declared them
as successful candidates in January.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission took form in 2005 under a law established
by the liberal government of Roh Moo-hyun to reveal hidden truth in Korea's
turbulent modern history. Its investigation has shed light on those who amassed
their wealth by collaborating with the 1910-45 Japanese colonial rule, Korean
civilians killed by their own government during the 1950-53 Korean War and
suppression of democracy activists by previous military rulers.
hkim@yna.co.kr
(END)
D