South Korea’s new head of the antitrust watchdog said Wednesday the Fair Trade Commission will not carry out chaebol reform at an excessively high pace, toning down his original hard-line stance.

Kim Sang-jo, who was appointed as the FTC chairman by President Moon Jae-in on Tuesday despite strong objection from conservative opposition parties, had vowed to enhance monitoring on the four largest business groups -- Samsung, Hyundai Motor, SK and LG -- when picked as the nominee for FTC chief a month ago.

Strongly slamming President Moon’s decision to push ahead with Kim‘s designation despite their opposition, the Liberty Korea Party staged protests and held a series of in-party meetings to discuss their next steps, delaying for several hours the confirmation hearings of three other ministers slated for the day. 

“I told the president and his secretaries yesterday that chaebol reform cannot be done as swiftly like that on the prosecution,” Kim told reporters after his inauguration in the government administrative city of Sejong.

“Corporate issues usually involve conflicting interests and are unpredictable. I will not try to do everything at once.”

Apparently mindful of concerns that taking a unilateral approach in regulating the four big groups might hurt the overall business sentiment in Korea, Kim said he would not be too pushy in chaebol reform.

Earlier in the morning in his inauguration speech, Kim reiterated his resolve to change the corporate environment, saying the FTC should be able to check the power of conglomerates to protect economic and social underdogs.

He has been dubbed a “chaebol sniper” by the local media for his longtime shareholder activism.

“What our society demands from the FTC is to protect economic and social underdogs, to prevent abusive economic power of conglomerates and to wipe away tears of subcontractors, franchise member firms and small vendors,” Kim said in his inauguration speech.

“There will be no hesitation in my efforts to establish a fair market order. I will never step back.”

While family-owned conglomerates are often criticized for their unfair deals with subcontractors and small- and medium-sized enterprises, Kim reiterated his will to enlarge the FTC’s current “business group division” to “business group bureau” to better monitor such unfair deals. Earlier, he said the FTC should impose higher fines on conglomerates that funnel contracts and business orders to their affiliates.

Kim also said he would seek cooperation with lawmakers to push further reformative measures such as adopting class action in broader sectors to enhance the rights of minority consumers against corporate wrongdoings.

“Issues such as scrapping the FTC’s exclusive rights to charge and adopting class action are impossible to move forward without cooperation and working together with the National Assembly, as they need law revisions,” Kim said, vowing to listen to all walks of life and discuss them with lawmakers.

To enhance internal discipline, he urged FTC officials to refrain from contacting ex-FTC high ranking officials and executives at law firms.

“If you really have to contact them, make sure you do it on record. I urge you to do this to restore trust in FTC,” he said.

The watchdog has been under criticism after it was discovered that ex-FTC officials were often found to be taking executive-level posts at law firms and conglomerates, which could weaken the FTC’s monitoring of such firms.

By Kim Yoon-mi  (yoonmi@heraldcorp.com)