Choo Mi-ae "Did the nightjars cry every night to get 29 votes at the Expo?"

Former Minister Choo Mi-ae's Facebook Post
"'Money is scarce' Only Money Complaints Echo in Republic of Korea"

Former Minister of Justice Choo Mi-ae blamed the government for the failure to host the 2030 World Expo (Expo) in Busan, saying, "The cuckoo must have cried every night to get 29 votes."

On the 29th, Choo posted on her Facebook, "'Sotjeokda sotjeokda donjeokda donjeokda' (meaning 'too little money'), we had no choice but to lose narrowly because we had too little money to compete with Saudi Arabia," and criticized, "In a distant foreign land, only Korea's money talk echoed loudly."

Former Minister of Justice Choo Mi-ae. Photo by Facebook

Then, seemingly targeting Minister of Justice Han Dong-hoon and President Yoon Seok-yeol, Choo said, "Thanks to the minister who couldn't crack the password, I even learned that 'Malta' and 'Andorra' are countries on Earth," and added, "Thanks to President Kopi, I realized that even if we challenge the Guinness World Records with a rushed summit, we shouldn't laugh but rather applaud and admire it. Oh, what a pity. The cuckoo must have cried every night to get 29 votes."

Choo also said, "'How much is one vote worth?' The shop owner spat phlegm and turned off the TV in a store where they barely sold a bowl of gukbap (Korean soup with rice) after buying 300,000 won worth of groceries, falling behind on rent and facing closure."

Meanwhile, Busan received 29 votes in the vote to select the host city for 2030 held at the 173rd General Assembly of the International Bureau of Expositions (BIE) in Paris, France, on the 28th (local time), suffering a heavy defeat to first-place Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, which received 119 votes.

President Yoon said, "As the president who led and is responsible for the Expo bid, I sincerely apologize to the citizens of Busan and all our people for the disappointment," adding, "I also met with leaders of 96 countries and had direct phone calls with leaders of dozens of countries, but the predictions about our position that we felt through public and private contacts were largely off. All of this is entirely my fault."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.