It is said that recently in North Korea, the number of cases of Workers’ Party members who received social security secretly engaging in economic activities to make money is increasing.
On the 21st, a Daily NK Hamgyongnam-do source said, “Recently, in Hamheung City and other cities and counties in Hamgyeongnam-do, the number of party members who receive social security and engage in business activities behind the scenes is increasing,” adding, “This is because if you receive social security, you can be excluded from the life of the party organization until it is released. “It was reported.
To become a party member in North Korea, one must not only have good background but also undergo ideological verification. They can be said to be loyalists with a relatively high level of loyalty to the party and the leader, but the source said that the number of such party members receiving social security in order to avoid party life and make money has been increasing recently.
Social security is a type of social benefit system in which people who are recognized as temporarily incapable of working due to illness or disability are exempt from the obligation to go to work. However, recently in South Hamgyong Province, there has been a noticeable increase in the number of cases where party members bribe doctors and others to obtain medical certificates proving their inability to work and are recognized as eligible for social security.
A source said, “The number of people who have received or are trying to receive social security is increasing rapidly, and most of them are party members. The problem is that they are actively engaged in business activities after receiving social security.”
The background to this phenomenon is the deepening of living difficulties after COVID-19 and the strengthening of party organizational discipline. The explanation is that while economic difficulties are continuing, they cannot miss out on organizational life just because they are party members, so they came up with a way to receive social security.
For example, early this month, Mr. Kim (pseudonym), a party member in his 40s who lived and worked in the Heungnam district of Hamheung City, submitted a medical certificate stating that he had a mental problem and received social security. He succeeded in receiving social security by pretending to have a mental illness for several months in order to become eligible for social security, when in fact he had no mental problems at all.
A source said, “In order to meet the conditions to receive social security, party members work with doctors who bribe them and act like sick patients for several months and eventually receive social security recognition,” adding, “If they receive social security like this, they will be able to participate in party life every week.” “It’s like killing two birds with one stone because you don’t have to participate in general meetings and you can even engage in business activities,” he said.
The source continued, “It’s hard to make a living now, but we have to go to work every day, and party members work harder than ordinary people, so many people now find party membership cards, which used to be more precious than life, to be a nuisance.” “Do you think the words will come out often?” he said.
The South Hamgyong Provincial Party Committee, which was seriously aware of this situation, is known to have convened a meeting of party secretaries in the middle of this month to come up with countermeasures. The provincial party is said to have set a policy of expelling any party member who is found to have received social security by paying a bribe and legally punishing the person in charge (party secretary) of the party organization he belongs to as well as the medical sector workers who received bribes from him.
The source said that the party secretaries are in a state of panic, but the party members who actually received social security are not giving up and saying, “If you want me to leave the party, do it.” The party secretaries are having a hard time, the source said.
Source: www.dailynk.com
