회고回顧/懷古

Where is Kim Min-seok's Democratic Party headed?

Kim Min-seok's victory over Jeong Cheong-rae of the Shincheonji team for the party leader position was a precious win for the Lee Jae-myung administration and for the future of South Korea. However, from the start, Lee Jin-sook is pushing the 5.18 incident as a rebellion, and Cho Kuk is acting like he's in charge by bringing up the issue of merging the Cho Kuk Innovation Party with the ruling party. Not to be outdone, public opinion is chiming in, accelerating discussions on integration, acting like a parasite on a bear's talent. There's no need for the ruling party to become amateur just because it's dealing with an amateur party.

The world is at the end of civilization, where man-made and natural disasters mix to threaten the habitation of living creatures, yet there is no thought of stopping wars. Korea, however, is slow to react to international affairs, engrossed in internal power struggles. Western Europe siding with Israel and aligning with the escalating tensions with Russia seems to be an attempt to shift the war to East Asia, whether it's Poland, which bought Korean weapons, or Ukraine, which is clamoring for them. This, too, is a dead end. Given the current domestic power struggle that completely ignores such global affairs, there's enough energy to be blinded by power and refuse even to evacuate, even if a natural disaster strikes. Where did Cho Kuk, who was a Seoul National University law professor, get the power to transform his private desires into public energy, with a global upheaval on the horizon? Is Cho Kuk's attack, which makes President Lee Jae-myung, who pardoned him, look like a shabby beggar prince, truly the sign of a future king?

The source of division symbolized by the pro/anti-Cho Kuk rallies

In the fall of 2019, Gwanghwamun in Seoul and the Seocho-gu area were sharply divided over the resignation and defense of Cho Kuk, and the public was once again split. People held pickets not only on the streets but also in underpasses, some shouting for his defense, others advocating against him. Cho Kuk's resume seemed perfectly suited to be the right person for prosecutorial reform during the Moon Jae-in administration. At least, if it weren't for Yoon Suk-yeol's rebellion, South Korea would be progressing towards a world where power shifts from Moon Jae-in to Yoon Suk-yeol, and then to Cho Kuk, where the dreams of Shincheonji, the Unification Church, Kim Eo-jun, and Yoo Si-min would come true, and even Jeong Cheong-rae could dream. If their grand plan had succeeded, Cho Kuk's problems would have forever slept beneath the surface, unknown to anyone.

Cho Kuk's problems are as follows: 1. Unclear family relations: Besides Cho Kuk and his mother Park Jeong-suk (朴貞淑, 1936? or 1937?), the birth and death years and Chinese characters for his father Cho Byeon-hyeon and great-grandfather Cho Maeng-hwan, as well as his siblings, are uncertain. 2. Cho Kuk's own age: There are records indicating that he maintained the 1963 birth year until his twenties, and his daughter Cho Min also changed her birth month from February to September 1991. It seems this family is very lenient with such household register corrections and considers unconventional practices natural. 3. The fact that his father, Cho Byeon-hyeon (whose Chinese characters in the family registry differ from his actual name), the founder of Woongdong Academy, considered Gye-gwang School (啓光學校) as the spiritual (?) origin of Woongdong Academy, and that there is no explanation for the frequent misunderstanding that his grandfather Cho Maeng-hwan is the same person as the founder of Woongdong Academy and an independence activist.

As you can see, the birth and death dates of Jo Maeng-hwan, the grandfather, are unknown. There are two people with the same name: Jo Maeng-hwan (曺孟煥, 1899~1961), who participated in the March 1st Movement in Changwon in April 1919 and whose real name is known as Jo Maeng-jo (曺孟祚), and Jo Maeng-hwan (曺孟煥), who participated in the Yeonggwang March 1st Movement in March of the same year, 1919. Even in an era without telephones, the simultaneous March 1st demonstrations held across the country are historical events worthy of research. However, compared to the relatively well-known personal information of the founders of private educational foundations established by those who endured this era, the information about Jo Guk's grandfather is exceptionally scarce. If Jo Maeng-hwan of Changwon were Jo Guk's grandfather, we should know Jo Guk as a descendant of a national leader, but the reality is different.

All these questions could be clarified if Jo Guk were to disclose his grandfather's family register and the genealogy or family tree of the Changnyeong Jo clan. While the Family Register Act has undergone revisions and abolitions over time to ensure maximum individual privacy, candidates who wish to become high-ranking public officials should be required by law to disclose a minimum amount of family information to the public. The fact that Korea is the only country on Earth that has never punished anti-nationalism is precisely the cause of divisive politics.

Acquirer of Woongdong Academy, Jo Byeon-hyeon, CEO of Goryeo General Construction

Jo Byeon-hyeon is said to have graduated from Woongdong School and Goryeo University in Jinhae, and then made money in the construction industry by applying for a joint patent for concrete waterproofing and insulation construction methods. It is known that he then acquired Woongdong Academy, which was in poor financial condition, around 1985 and became its chairman. According to a real estate registry investigation by Maeil Business Newspaper, the school corporation Woongdong Academy was established in 1964, and a significant portion of the school land and assets were donated by local residents between 1964 and 1968. Then, in 1989, 'Goryeo General Construction' newly acquired a construction business license. Although it went bankrupt in 1997, in the 1990s, it was a construction company with a general construction business, and some construction work was subcontracted to Goryeo City Development, which was involved with Jo Byeon-hyeon's second son, Jo Guk's younger brother, Jo Kwon.

In the late 1990s, during Cho Byeon-hyeon's tenure as chairman, the site of Ungdong Middle School in the existing central Macheon-dong was sold as an apartment site, and the school was relocated to a corporate-owned site on the mountainside, with a new school building constructed around 1996-1998. Koryo General Construction, owned by Cho Byeon-hyeon, won the contract.

However, the 90s were a time when general construction company licenses were bought and sold. From the 70s until the 1988 Olympics, new general construction licenses were virtually frozen for about 13 years to prevent the proliferation of construction companies and excessive competition. As a result, a significant amount of private construction involved the buying and selling of general construction licenses through 'company transfer and acquisition.' License lending, where licenses were borrowed and lent, was subject to cancellation and criminal penalties, but it was a common practice. In 1989, new general construction licenses were allowed again. The point at which Koryo General Construction obtained its construction business license in 1989 was at the end of the period when license trading was rampant and the beginning of when new licenses were released all at once. However, Cho Byeon-hyeon's joint patent technology alone does not meet the general license criteria (capital, multiple civil engineering/architectural technicians, office). It is unclear whether a general construction license was needed for the construction of Ungdong Academy, but just as the information about the Cho family is uncertain, the general construction license is also suspicious. I believe an explanation from him is necessary.

There are two people who remember Cho Byeon-hyeon. One is a person who worked as a teacher at Ungdong School from 1978, and the other is a former director of Ungdong Academy. What Cho Byeon-hyeon did before he was known as a general contractor is not clear, but the image of him as 'originally a successful businessman in Busan' is largely due to the recollections of former teacher Kim Yong-ho, who worked at Ungdong Middle School from 1978. His articles related to Cho Byeon-hyeon have continued to this day. On the other hand, Kim Hyeong-gap (金亨甲, 1938?~2020), former head of the Gyeongnam branch of the Korea Liberation Association and former director of Ungdong Academy, who was the only witness to attend the confirmation hearing for former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk in September 2019, was a friend of Cho Byeon-hyeon. At the hearing, he made a bombshell statement that the Cho Kuk family's school management was opaque and that Minister Cho Kuk's grandfather was not an independence activist, and he died in September 2020 (at the age of 83). Former director Kim Hyeong-gap is known as the grandson of Myeonsan Kim Seon-o (金善五, October 1, 1865~1919), who was shot and killed by Japanese military police while shouting for independence at the Mukye-ri market in Jangyu, Gimhae, on April 12, 1919. If Kim Hyeong-gap's testimony is true, the theory that Cho Maeng-gyu (曺孟奎, dates of birth and death unknown), a teacher from Ungdong-myeon and an anti-Japanese activist and labor activist, is Cho Kuk's great-uncle could be false.

Jo Maeng-gyu (曺孟奎, 1900?~after 1947), of the Changnyeong Jo clan, was a teacher at Gyegwang School in Ungdong-myeon, Changwon-gun, Gyeongnam. In 1930, he was arrested by Japanese colonial police for the National Humiliation Day Incitement Incident and the Ungcheon Red Peasant Union Incident. He also participated in organizing female workers at Dongyang Silk Reeling Co., Ltd. in Jinhae and Joseon Spinning Co., Ltd. in Busan. After liberation, he served as head of the Cultural Department of the National Council of Korean Trade Unions, a central committee member of the Democratic People's Front, and head of the Labor Department of the Workers' Party of South Korea. Jo Maeng-gyu is said to have been active in Seoul until 1947, but his exact birth and death dates and whether he went to North Korea are unconfirmed, and it is unknown if he was assassinated. Typically, such figures are branded as communists, which is a traditional interpretation of colonial historiography. However, if the person colonial historiography wants to hide is the great-grandfather of Cho Kuk, then the hidden hero should be made known to the world. If Jo Maeng-gyu, as well as Jo Maeng-hwan, were unrelated to the anti-Japanese movement, then Cho Kuk should step forward.

Changwon, Yeonggwang, Gimhae... On March 1, 1919, when the Manse demonstrations began, the Japanese imperialists did not hesitate to kill people, pointing guns with military police at the forefront, yet many people risked death. Why is there no in-depth research into where and on what scale the March 1st Movement continued? Unlike Kim Seon-oh's grandson, Jo Maeng-hwan's grandson must answer as a public figure for the historical void that arises from his unclear whereabouts.