OMEGA X’s agency issues apology, announces resignation of CEO alleged to have mistreated boyband

SPIRE Entertainment, the agency behind OMEGA X, has announced the resignation of the CEO who is alleged to have mistreated the boyband.

On November 7, the K-pop agency released a statement via OMEGA X’s official fan café website issuing an apology to the boyband as well as their families and supporters. This follows weeks of controversy surrounding SPIRE Entertainment, after fans and news outlets began circulating clips that allegedly depicted CEO Kang Seong-hee’s mistreatment of the group in late October.

The videos in question included several instances where Kang appeared to be raising her voice at the group. In one instance, she was allegedly filmed claiming that a member of the group was “just acting” after he collapsed while Kang was chastising the group.

“We deeply apologise to all OMEGA X members, families, fans, and everyone whose feelings were hurt by an unfortunate event that has happened recently,” said the agency in its new statement, per Soompi.

In the same statement, SPIRE also announced the resignation of “the CEO who’s responsible for this matter”, presumably referring to Kang, though it did not name the CEO. It went on to apologise for “not responding well and disappointing many fans with inadequate response to the situation,” and promised to provide a better environment for their artists.

The agency did not explicitly refer to a specific incident in this statement. SPIRE had claimed in October that Kang and OMEGA X had simply been airing their grievances when they got “worked up” and “began raising their voices”. Kang herself also denied the allegations of mistreatment to South Korean news outlet SBS News, and claimed that the footage had been circulated by a malicious “anti-fan”.

SPIRE Entertainment’s statement comes just a day after the members of OMEGA X created an independent Instagram account and made a group statement regarding the controversy after weeks of silence on social media.

In their post, the boyband spoke of “painful times” and experiencing “unwarranted treatment” by their agency. They also shared that they were under “pressure” from SPIRE Entertainment that prevented them from speaking freely on social media.

OMEGA X members have yet to make a response regarding their agency’s apology and the resignation of their CEO at the time of publication.

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