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South Korean giant Samsung Electronics apologized on Wednesday September 18. The day before, its president had been found guilty of maneuvers to prevent its employees from forming a union. He was sentenced to 18 months in prison with his vice president and the two men were immediately imprisoned.
" Me alive, unions will never be allowed, " thundered the founder of Samsung , the largest of the Chaebols , these South Korean family conglomerates.
The company has obviously given itself the means of this detestation. By condemning Tuesday, December 17, the president and vice-president of Samsung Electronics, as well as several other officials of the world's leading manufacturer of smartphones and memory chips, the Seoul court described multiple violations of labor law.
Orders had therefore been given to lower the remuneration of employees wishing to unionize, as well as to investigate their private life to use certain aspects, such as the level of debt or, for women, the fact of being pregnant. Not to mention the closure of subcontracting companies to unions that are a little too active.
► Read also: South Korea: Samsung's anti-union policy on the dock
Samsung and its troubled political connections
Samsung Electronics, the flagship of the Samsung group, therefore apologized this Wednesday, December 18, with Samsung C and T, the construction and public works division of the group, of which several leaders were convicted for the same reasons.
If the role of Samsung has been decisive in making the country the fourth economic power in Asia, its influence and its troubled political connections are beginning to be called into question. Its vice-president Lee Jae-yong is tried again for corruption, in connection with the scandal which brought down at the end of 2016 Park Geun-hye, the South Korean president.