Meeting with the president should be reopen to media

During former President Moon Jae-in’s term, the ‘Senior Secretary and Presidential Aide Meeting’ was held every Monday at the Blue House, which was presided over by the president. Blue House staff at the secretary level and above convened at the meeting to listen to the president's remarks, make presentations, and discuss current issues. As a media pool reporter taking turns attending the occasion, I have vivid memories of entering the conference held in the Blue House’s Yeomin Hall, responding directly to the president’s remarks, and reporting the event.

One of the differences I noticed while entering the Presidential Office of President Yoon Suk Yeol, which was moved to Yongsan, was the meeting was renamed as ‘Meeting of Chief Secretaries Presided over by the President.’ The meeting differs from the previous administration's setting in that it is attended by a few senior secretaries, rather than many, and held privately. After holding the private meeting, the spokesperson simply announces the president's major remarks to the media. The message released after the meeting on Monday was only one sentence: “President Yoon instructed us to ‘make every effort to inspect unpaid wages, stabilize prices and the emergency medical system’ ahead of the Chuseok holiday.”

The meetings were disclosed to the media even during the former Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye administrations. When I asked an official in the President's Office in the early days of the current administration, I was told that "the meeting was kept private because of doorstepping." Reportedly, President Yoon did not feel the need to disclose the meeting due to daily Q&A with reporters on his way to work. Doorstepping, which had been conducted 61 times since President Yoon took office, was discontinued six months after being introduced in November 2022 due to protesting questions from an MBC reporter and arguments by officials from the President's Office. “Doorstepping was designed to promote open communication with the public,” explained President Yoon. “We will consider whether to resume if a plan is developed to best serve its purpose,” he said. It has still not resumed for more than one year and ten months.

There are rumors within the Presidential Office about moving the press room on the first floor of the building to the new building of the Defense Information Agency. Although the justification is to provide a more comfortable environment for journalists, the move is seen as resolving the lack of space in the government building and creating a greater distance from the press, perhaps perceived as a nuisance to those in power.

I wonder if President Yoon’s perception of the media has changed from its previous position of valuing communication. One positive sign is that President Yoon held a government briefing and press conference last month and kept his promise to hold quarterly press conferences.

The ‘Meeting of Chief Secretaries Presided over by the President’ is a channel through which the president's thoughts and messages are conveyed directly to the people once a week, along with the weekly cabinet meeting chaired by the president. It should be considered that the meeting should be reopened to the public event attended by reporters so that the President’s messages can be conveyed. The president’s avoidance of media when he has gone only halfway through his term may be interpreted as a lack of confidence or refusal to communicate.