President Moon Jae-in apologized to the people Tuesday over alleged insider property speculation involving officials at the state-owned housing supply body, two weeks after the revelation of the case by civic groups.

"I am sorry for having caused great concern to the people," he said at the start of a weekly Cabinet meeting.

The case has brought about a "great sense of despondency and disappointment" among the public, he added.

The apology followed a string of strong messages from Moon on the incident, mostly calling for a thorough probe.

At least 20 employees of the Korea Land and Housing Corp. (LH) purchased huge swathes of undeveloped land in areas around Seoul, allegedly on the basis of classified information, well ahead of the government's announcement on projects to build new residential towns there.

The scandal has added fuel to public anger that has already been running high, with housing prices and rents continuing to soar across South Korea under the Moon administration.

The president reiterated that the government is determined to eradicate real estate-related corruption among civil servants.

He again used the politically sensitive words of "deep-rooted evils" and "candlelight revolution."

"If we clean up the deep-rooted evil associated with real estate, which is most important root of our society's unfairness, on this occasion, it would serve as a turning point for our country to move toward a fairer and more transparent society," he said.

Moon and his supporters use the expression "deep-rooted evils" largely in reference to political and social malpractices that they claim accumulated when the two conservative presidents -- Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye -- were in power for nearly a decade. Park was impeached in 2017 amid a wave of popular candlelight vigils.

Moon also stressed the need for the "fundamental reform" of government-owned enterprises to have them focus more on their public responsibility and duty.

The starting point is to enhance the ethical standards of public officials, he added. (Yonhap)