Park Heong-joon calls Lee Jun-seok's 'conspiracy theory' an attempt to shift blame for failed nomination

Former Busan Mayor Park Heong-joon rebuffed allegations by Reform Party leader Lee Jun-seok linking the People Power Party to the staged-incident scandal involving former Reform Party Busan mayoral candidate Jeong I-han, calling the claim "a baseless conspiracy theory."

Park issued a statement Monday through Seo Ji-yeon, who served as campaign spokesperson during the June 3 elections, saying the staged incident "was already known to Jeong and to police through a confession last May, and Park's campaign committee only learned of it after the election through news reports." He called the allegations "a textbook example of old-style politics — shifting the blame for a failed nomination onto another camp."

Former spokesperson Seo demanded the Reform Party answer for its own vetting failures. "The logic that a staged incident was carried out to enable a candidate merger doesn't hold, because there was no merger," she said. She called on the party to explain how a candidate it had put through multiple vetting procedures ended up at the center of a staged-incident scandal, what the party had verified during the nomination process, and what its official position and response were after learning of the incident.

Jeong had claimed he was the victim of an "attack" after falling while trying to dodge a beverage thrown by a driver during campaigning for the Busan mayoral race on April 27. The incident was later found to have been staged, and Jeong was detained Wednesday on charges including obstruction of official duties by deception and violations of the Public Official Election Act.

The controversy was set off by a Facebook post Reform Party leader Lee published Saturday. Lee raised the possibility that someone within the People Power Party had orchestrated the scheme, pointing to Jeong's past work as a staff aide for the party. "If a certain camp made a suspicious proposal to the former candidate, they will not be able to escape responsibility," Lee said.

In response, People Power Party lawmaker Ju Jin-woo, who served as standing campaign committee chairman for the Park campaign, pushed back Sunday on his own Facebook page. "Lee Jun-seok's claim of a People Power Party conspiracy further infuriates Busan voters who were deceived — it is the height of audacity," Ju wrote, adding that the People Power Party had no reason to help Jeong split the vote. He also said "political police" had delayed arresting Jeong and making his confession public, allowing him to complete the race.

Meanwhile, when reports of Jeong's staged incident first emerged on June 18, Reform Party leader Lee apologized to Busan residents and others, saying the party bore unlimited responsibility for the affair.