For Korea Inc., Money and Politics Make an Awkward Olympics<br />Last April, when members of the Pyeongchang Organizing Committee met with South Korea’s finance minister to discuss the committee’s financial troubles, its chairman said<br />that the bribery scandal was one reason organizers were having difficulty attracting corporate sponsorships, according to the Yonhap news agency.<br />Three leaders of Pyeongchang’s winning campaign to host the Winter Games were industrialists who had, at one point or another, been convicted of financial crimes: Mr. Lee of Samsung, Cho Yang-ho of Korean Air<br />and Park Yong-sung, formerly of the Doosan conglomerate.<br />The corruption allegations that ensnared Mr. Lee’s son and heir — and<br />that last year felled Park Geun-hye, then South Korea’s president — involved bribery via sports sponsorships.<br />“That puts the chaebol in a very sensitive position.”<br />One result: Korean companies, fearful that their contributions would be “misinterpreted,” were skittish for a long time<br />about sponsoring the Pyeongchang Games, said Chang Sea-jin, a professor at the National University of Singapore.
