“P-please spare us. Team Leader!”
The heavy silence lasted only a moment.
A man suddenly dropped to his knees in front of me.
“I was wrong a hundred times over! I’ve committed a crime worthy of death! But anything but that, please!”
With that as the signal, all the company presidents began to kneel.
-Yes, Team Leader, we truly deserve death. We will never engage in bid-rigging again!
-If you give us a chance, we’ll submit new construction costs. If you can’t trust us, we won’t participate in the bidding at all. So please, just not that...
Was this really something worth all this? Enough to make the presidents of South Korea’s foremost construction companies bow their heads?
At first, I was flustered, but their intense reaction gradually began to amuse me. If it was enough to make them kneel, it couldn’t be anything ordinary. It seemed the construction companies were holding on to quite a lot of interesting material.
“Please get up. I don’t want to have a conversation this way.”
-Please take back what you said first. That subject is truly taboo in our industry.
“I don’t think that’s something you should be saying to me.”
-T-Team Leader!
“Answer me. Are you going to cooperate with me?”
When I pressed them again, President Kim of PM Construction stood up and said,
“Team Leader. Do you really know what you’re saying?”
“Yes, I know very well.”
“Then you should also know it isn’t something you can speak of lightly. If this gets out to the public, there will be no containing it. It’s dangerous for us, of course, but it will be dangerous for you as well.”
“When did I say I was going to leak it?”
I smiled faintly.
“Then why...?”
“I just want to know.”
“P-please at least tell us why. Why are you curious about that? Did someone ask you for it? If so, couldn’t you just give us a narrowed-down list of the people that person needs?”
“No. Give me everything. All of it.”
As I said that, I handed a document to each of the presidents sitting there pitiably.
The moment they checked it, their eyes widened.
“Of course, I’m not asking empty-handed.”
“T-this is...”
“It’s a list of undisclosed support projects. The government will be sending reconstruction funds to Russia through several indirect channels as well. But with Europe watching so fiercely, we won’t be able to openly recruit contractors.”
“...”
“So, if possible, we intend to give this opportunity to companies that participated in Ukraine’s reconstruction.”
“...”
“What do you think? The scale is fairly large. If possible, would you all take this on too?”
The eyes that had been filled with fear only moments ago quickly shifted into greed.
The reconstruction funds for Russia that the government had agreed on this time amounted to roughly ten billion dollars, and that money alone meant at least a year’s worth of work for the construction companies.
“I’m overlooking the collusion, and I’m even giving you new work. Are you still going to ignore my request?”
At that moment, one president in the back rose awkwardly.
-With all due respect, Team Leader, we aren’t ignoring you. It’s just that this is truly a dangerous matter.
“If you keep refusing to help like this, I’ll hear it by force if I have to.”
-...By force?
“I’ll report the bid-rigging to the Fair Trade Commission and demand a full investigation. The public is already extremely dissatisfied that we’re giving reconstruction funds to a country on the other side of the world that has nothing to do with us. If collusion comes out on top of that, the aid will go up in smoke.”
Their faces turned blue.
“And do you think that’ll be all? Once it’s reported like that, the prosecution will start digging into separate cases, then separate cases from those, and then launch all sorts of side investigations. Then everything that’s been overlooked until now will rise to the surface.”
-...
“Then even the site cafeteria corruption from apartments built ten years ago will come spilling out one after another. Do we really need to go that far?”
No sooner had I finished speaking than several of the presidents turned deathly pale.
It wasn’t only corporations that fed off government money. Executives fed off company money too.
Someone must have remembered company projects they had siphoned off under a relative’s name; someone else, the entertainment they had received from subcontractors; and another, the stock purchases made using insider information.
The grease money for the old gentlemen was a corporate-level problem, but these were personal problems. Compared to having the company’s internal audit team take direct aim at them, it would be a hundred times better to see construction corruption breaking on the news every day.
-Team Leader, if we cooperate with you, what happens to the Russia projects?
A sharp-eyed president broke the silence and raised his hand.
I answered him with a bright smile.
“Naturally, more work should go to the company that cooperates. Personally, I think first come, first served sounds fair. More work for the company that provides the materials first?”
-Then you truly won’t make an issue of the collusion...?
“I promise. Not only will I let the collusion pass, but I’ll also give you the Russia reconstruction work. Above all else, I absolutely will not leak these materials recklessly.”
After saying that, I added in a warning tone,
“But if you’re going to help, then help properly. I have no intention of taking a few nobodies and calling it quits. I want materials on major figures in politics—senior lawmakers, multiple-term legislators, heavyweights. If the scale is large, then not only in Russia, but in other projects as well, I will make sure you are paid what you’re worth.”
The construction industry was quick on the uptake, as expected.
Once they confirmed that my intention was firm, there was no sign of resistance again. On the contrary, a few people were swallowing their saliva at the mention of Russia.
“That’s all I wanted to say. Please discuss it thoroughly at the company level and give me a favorable answer.”
*
Chairman Park Minsu, who had been chain-smoking, looked at his executives around the time his cigarettes ran out.
“This is your last chance. Tell me one more time. Why did that bastard tell us to bring him those materials?”
None of the executives answered.
It was already the fifth time he had asked the same question. No matter how plausible the reason they gave, they had been unable to convince the chairman.
“Did our PM Construction executives win their positions in a game of Go-Stop? Why can’t a single one of you give me a satisfactory answer!”
In truth, Chairman Park’s reaction was not impossible to understand.
An employee from the pension fund had suddenly appeared and demanded the cabinet files. Would he really just hold on to such explosive materials?
-Chairman, may I say something?
When everyone else remained silent, the vice chairman opened his mouth.
“Vice Chairman? Go ahead.”
-If it’s neither this nor that, then there’s only one possibility left.
“What’s that?”
-It seems like a test stage.
“What stage?”
-I’m saying it looks like the old gentlemen who’ve been taking pocket money from us are tossing out bait.
“Wh-what?”
He adjusted his glasses.
-To put it bluntly, when have we ever received a demand like this before? If they had someone they wanted dealt with, they would point that person out and tell us to bring the materials.
“...Now that I think about it, that is extremely strange.”
-Chairman, that suspicion is correct. It seems a National Assembly member who took pocket money from us is probing us to confirm our loyalty.
“...That makes sense. It does make sense. I thought it made no sense for a young punk to demand such enormous materials.”
He turned his head back toward the vice chairman.
“Then whose orders is that young man acting on?”
-It’s obvious, isn’t it? Wouldn’t it be the Blue House?
“The president?”
-Yes. Frankly, the person who received the most slush funds from us was the president. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say the construction industry raised him. So I believe he sent someone indirectly to test us.
Chairman Park, who had been listening carefully, tilted his head at the end.
“That’s a bit strange, though.”
-...Pardon?
“Even early in his term, when the Blue House’s power was at its strongest, he didn’t particularly try to keep us quiet. Why would he do it at the end of his term?”
-...That’s...
“That man has already played out his hand. These days, his control over the party isn’t what it used to be either. Would someone like that have the leisure to muzzle the construction industry?”
-N-now that you mention it, that’s true. Then could it be President Kim Sangcheol’s biggest political rival? In that case, perhaps it would be best to hand over materials on the president and his close aides...
As all sorts of speculation poured out, President Kim, who had been personally dragged to the Public Procurement Service, spoke.
“Chairman. That issue isn’t important at all. If we start digging into it, there will be no end.”
Chairman Park raised his eyebrows.
“Depending on how we run our mouths, the company could either be torn apart or survive. How is that not important?”
“With all due respect, the company is already on the verge of being torn apart.”
“...What did you say?”
“We’ve carried out two rounds of high-intensity restructuring, but with this year’s losses, we’re now in the red for the fourth consecutive year. This is no longer something that can be solved through restructuring. The work has dried up completely.”
Chairman Park let out a low groan.
“You’re saying we’re in no position to be picky about cold rice or hot rice... Is that it?”
“Yes. As someone who personally attended the meeting at the Public Procurement Service, I saw the reactions of our competitors with my own eyes. Every last one of them had gone mad with greed.”
“...”
“In truth, this isn’t a matter of choice. If we refuse their demand, the Fair Trade Commission will discover the bid-rigging. Then the contracts we won will vanish, and the Russia reconstruction project will vanish too.”
President Kim clenched his molars.
He, too, had imagined countless possibilities before telling Chairman Park this. Why such a demand had been made, whose intention it was, what purpose it served... But the more that process repeated, the more one thing became clear.
Whether we die this way or that way, when we’re at the end of the line and one step from death, does such worrying really have any meaning? No—do we even have a choice?
“One thing is certain: the others will definitely talk. I’ve engaged in bid-rigging with them several times until now, and whenever it looked like we might get caught, one of them always betrayed the rest. Do you think this time will be any different?”
Chairman Park pressed his fingers to the space between his brows and said,
“So how far does President Kim think we should spill...?”
“Everything, just as that man said. If necessary, even the materials on the president.”
“Th-that’s...”
“How he uses them will be for him to decide. But from speaking with him, he didn’t seem like a man without an exit strategy. He will surely use them in a limited way, according to his objective.”
“What is that objective... We need to have at least a vague idea if we’re going to keep pace.”
“This is only a cautious thought, but in the end, I think it’s a party nomination.”
“A nomination?”
“Yes. Frankly, aside from the industry being a little different, are there only one or two ambitious, greedy young prosecutors in Seocho-gu? There are truckloads of young men who look at first glance like they plan to go into politics later. Just like them, this man seems to be building a political career in his own way.”
Chairman Park, who had been reacting lukewarmly, reached the end of his hesitation.
When he thought of the other party not as an employee of the pension fund, but as an ambitious young prosecutor, it made a certain amount of sense. It wasn’t as though these were secret materials on operations against North Korea that no one in the world knew about... They were merely sharing, ever so slightly, materials sleeping in the prosecution’s cabinet.