Park Su-young, a People Power Party lawmaker who serves as the opposition secretary of the Strategy and Finance Committee of the National Assembly, criticized what he called the Lee Jae-myung administration's "purge of public officials," saying it has gone too far.
At a floor countermeasures meeting on the 23rd, Park said, "After the Ministry of Economy and Finance demanded that all seven senior civil servants at grade 1 submit their resignations en masse, there are reports that the Financial Services Commission also told all four grade-1 officials to resign," adding, "Most grade-1 officials have worked for more than 30 years, steadily moving up through Deputy Director, Director, and Director General, weathering all kinds of trials. They are the best experts in Korea in their fields." He added, "If you cut these experts all at once, who will raise the cattle?"
Park said, "Career civil servants must serve as a counterbalance in state affairs regardless of the political leanings of an administration," noting, "Although grade-1 officials do not have tenure, they are clearly career civil servants to whom the retirement age and honorary retirement allowances apply, and under Article 7 of the Constitution, their status as career civil servants and their political neutrality must be guaranteed."
He continued, "In 2018, the court held that 'even for a grade-1 civil servant, it cannot be interpreted that they may be dismissed at any time without justifiable reason, and to dismiss them, there must be objective and reasonable grounds; forcing dismissal without grounds is sufficient to be regarded as an unlawful and abusive exercise of official authority,'" adding that the court then convicted the defendants of abuse of power and coercion. "According to that ruling, the finance minister and the chairman of the Financial Services Commission are now committing abuse of power and coercion, and if this is at the direction of the Lee Jae-myung presidential office, President Lee Jae-myung would also be a co-principal conspirator," he said.
Park stressed, "The Lee Jae-myung administration should immediately stop illegal acts, protect Korea's top talent, and not undermine the neutrality of career civil servants."