Sewol ferry, an unended story
About a truth commission of Sewol ferry
The Sewol ferry disaster commemorated the seventh anniversary already. The Sewol disaster has remained a faraway past catastrophe at some point, as time passed to the point where Daewon high school students who had suffered the disaster at that time graduated from their university and are preparing for employment. Vociferous protests that people made to investigate the disaster even a few years ago with the whole nation shedding tears and consoling the victims’ families, are gradually diminishing. The victims’ families feel apologetic as they do not know why their family died in the disaster, while their living, even now we forget.
‘The truth commission of Sewol ferry disaster’ is a problem that the victims’ families want to be solved for the first. However, there is no progress until the seventh anniversary of the disaster. The truth commission is an issue which the country has been demanding since the Sewol ferry disaster. However, the investigation of the Moon Jae-in administration is also as inadequate as Park Geun-hye administration. The victim’s families are continuing to demand the truth commission which the Moon Jae-in administration promised, but no answer has returned yet. It is just as well that the Social Disaster Investigation Committee’s extension of activity urged the reform bills of a particular law for the disaster. Nevertheless, the bills haven't even gone through the plenary session. Eventually, the victim’s families are demanding the special law of the disaster with the firm will, with their hair shaved on January 22, 2021.
It is not true that the Moon Jae-in administration hadn’t made any effort. Since Moon Jae-in administration took office, the hull had been salvaged and Hull Investigation Committee had proved the cause of the accident in part, but all these efforts ended incompletely. Eventually, by making a special prosecution force launch, the prosecution investigated various allegations and Social Disaster Investigation Committee also made efforts for the truth commission. However, that was all. The outcome of the special investigation, which had been under way for a year and two months, was "not guilty.” Twenty people, including the Coast Guard Command and the Cheongwadae chief of staff, were handed over to trial. But they refused to admit the investigation due to the alleged inspection of the victim’s families and external pressure. They handed to the independent counsel, remaining the allegation of CCTV manipulation. The victims’ families criticized the investigation result with the previous investigation contents, arguing that truth commission had not been precise. Also, if the special law for the truth commission remains in this situation, Social Disaster Investigation Committee not only would not be able to demand more investigation contents, but to act because of statute of limitations which end in this April.
Victims’ families are staging a sit-in, waiting for the present administration to carry through the promised they made. The term of President Moon Jae-in, who promised the truth commission of Sewol Ferry disaster in fifth and sixth anniversary of the disaster, left not that much. Daegu 4.15 union is cheering the victim’s families saying “We don’t know all the truth of Sewol ferry disaster until seven years after the disaster. Time of memory, promise and responsibility should continue.”, commemorating the seventh anniversary of the disaster. The Sewol ferry disaster is an unended story. I sincerely hope that truth commission ends entirely so that the victims’ families could be relieved a little more than now.
English Translate / MFLHS TED
