Foundation Head Used Official Car for Commuting... Tells Reporter 'Rules Should Be Changed'

[Anchor]

An SBS investigation has confirmed that the board chair of a foundation affiliated with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been using an official vehicle—designated strictly for business purposes—for personal commuting. When asked whether this was a violation of regulations, the chair responded that the rules should be changed.

Reporter Park Jae-yeon reports.

[Reporter]

This foundation, an affiliate of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, employs around 20 staff members.

It operates one luxury sedan as an official vehicle for business use.

While the vehicle is supposed to be used by executives and employees only during business hours and strictly for official business, the vehicle operation logs obtained by SBS are filled with questionable entries.

In some entries, the purpose of travel was openly listed as "commute," recording trips to and from the apartment complex where Foundation Board Chair A lives. In other cases, trips were logged as "external meetings," but the records show the car actually traveled to and from the chair's residence during commuting hours.

In effect, the vehicle was used like the board chair's personal official car. However, the foundation's "Guidelines for the Management and Operation of Business Vehicles" stipulate that "vehicles may only be used during business hours" and "may only be used for the performance of official duties by executives and employees, with private use prohibited".

With no rule allowing the car to be used for the board chair's commute, SBS approached Board Chair A to ask on what grounds it was being used.

[Board Chair A: "I don't think this goes against customary practice or social norms. Heads of other organizations all do this, so why can't I, no matter how small our organization is?"]

When pressed again on whether this was a violation of regulations, the chair made absurd arguments, such as "the rules should be changed" and calling it "persecution of a small organization".

[Board Chair A: "You should be saying that the rules need to be changed. Saying that the board chair did something wrong is a form of persecuting small organizations like ours."]

Moreover, the foundation even hired a separate designated driver to operate this vehicle, spending 32.27 million won on driver costs last year alone.

The problem is that this expense was paid out of the foundation's "general operating expenses" budget.

Government guidelines clearly stipulate that general operating expenses may only be used for specific purposes, such as purchasing consumable goods or attending committee meetings.

[Kim Jun-hwan / Member of the National Assembly Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee (Democratic Party of Korea): "Because this is a case of recklessly spending taxpayers' money for personal convenience, I believe this is something that cannot be forgiven."]

According to the vehicle's operation logs, it has been used for commuting since at least 2021. The foundation stated, "We will revise the guidelines regarding the operation of dedicated vehicles to specify detailed standards".

(Video by Kang Dong-cheol and Choi Dae-woong | Video Editing by Jeon Min-gyu | Graphics by Jaegal Chan and Lee Jun-ho)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.