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[Exclusive] “Here We Go Again with the ‘Everything Is Min Hee-jin’s Doing’ Narrative… Were You Trying to Praise Min Hee-jin?” Min Hee-jin Pushes Back Against Claims Over NewJeans’ Contract m.entertain.naver.com/home/a… - Min Hee-jin’s side disputes HYBE’s claim that she was the driving force behind the contracts. - “The initial draft of the contract was prepared by HYBE’s Legal Team.” Sports Kyunghyang, Reporter Lee Sun-myeong Former ADOR CEO Min Hee-jin’s side has directly challenged HYBE over responsibility for NewJeans’ exclusive contracts. On November 6, Min Hee-jin’s side released a statement saying, “HYBE, it is time to move beyond this absurd ‘Everything Is Min Hee-jin’s Doing’ narrative and demonstrate accountability and a willingness to improve for the future of K-pop.” The statement was issued in response to HYBE’s rebuttal of a New York Times (NYT) report about NewJeans’ exclusive contracts. HYBE had argued that Min, rather than the company, was the party responsible for the contracts. Min Hee-jin’s side said, “HYBE claims that there was nothing wrong with the terms of NewJeans’ exclusive contracts, while simultaneously asserting that Min Hee-jin was the party behind all of these contracts. We have to ask whether HYBE released such a lengthy explanatory statement simply because it wanted to praise Min Hee-jin.” Her side maintains that HYBE was the party that drafted the contracts. “The initial draft of NewJeans’ exclusive contract was prepared by HYBE’s Legal Team,” the statement said. It explained that ADOR did not have an independent legal team at the time and that the contracts could not be finalized solely through the approval of ADOR’s CEO. They required agreement from HYBE’s Legal Team, Chief Financial Officer (CFO), and Chief Executive Officer (CEO). They also needed approval from ADOR’s board of directors, where two of the three inside directors were HYBE representatives. Min Hee-jin’s side also disclosed a message that ADOR’s then-vice president had sent to one of the members’ parents. The message read: “This is because HYBE is involved in the final decision-making process. However, since Min Hee-jin is the CEO, please trust ADOR, which she leads, and its staff, and leave things in their hands.” Her side also brought up events from 2024. In January of that year, Min Hee-jin requested that Park Ji-won, then HYBE CEO, grant her authority to execute important contracts, including exclusive artist contracts. Min Hee-jin’s side questioned HYBE’s position, saying, “If ADOR had sufficient authority to independently determine and execute the key terms of exclusive contracts, why would its CEO have needed to separately request that authority from the parent company?” HYBE had previously claimed that the contract wording was finalized through discussions involving Min Hee-jin, the vice president she had appointed, the members and their parents, among others. HYBE also claimed that the then-vice president had rejected proposals intended to reduce the artists’ financial burden. In response, Min Hee-jin’s side countered that it was ADOR’s decision not to make the members bear training-related expenses from their trainee days. Finally, Min Hee-jin’s side stated: “After designing a structure in which a subsidiary’s CEO cannot give approval without the approval of the parent company’s CEO, HYBE has now distributed a statement attempting to shift responsibility by creating someone to blame. This is essentially HYBE spitting in its own face.”