Yoon Suk-yeol, the ex-prosecutor who wants to become South Korea’s next president, was attempted to strike a liberation on Sunday. The candidate of the largest conservative opposition party, the PPP, contributed little to this. He did not deliver a brilliant speech, nor did he use wise arguments to beat his opponent Lee Jae-myung of the Democratic Party (DP) in a debate.
No, his wife, Kim Keon-hee, executive director of an event agency, stepped in front of the media and bowed deeply to the South Korean public, apologizing for her resume applying “to make it look better” when applying for teaching jobs. At PPP headquarters in Yeouido, Seoul, she said, “You can blame me for my mistakes, but please do not withdraw your support from my husband.” For Yoon and his followers, it was a salutary response to the ongoing negative media coverage. Case solved. Or?
2022 will be a year of change for South Korea. On March 9, a direct vote will be held to succeed Moon Jae-in, who will not be allowed to stand for re-election after his five-year term in office. We are looking for a statesman who will not only lead the tiger state out of the corona crisis into an emission-free future, but also, as a partner of the USA, will make peacemaking contributions to North Korea politics. The election campaign is on. But so far the candidates of the two largest parties have not shone with high-quality discussions. Yoon Suk-yeol and Moon’s fellow party member Lee Jae-myung have so far been mainly concerned with smear campaigns.
South Korea has only been a parliamentary democracy since 1987. The culture of debate in the country is not yet very advanced. And politics is divided. Here are the conservative heirs of the old authoritarian order. There the former freedom fighters who led the DP to power.
A president with little support threatens
People yell at each other instead of working on a better Korea in debates. This annoys many in the country. And the current candidates increase the disaffection. Among other things because of various revelations: DP man Lee Jae-myung has problems because he is allegedly involved in a land development scandal and because his son is allegedly too inclined to gamble. Yoon Suk-yeol, on the other hand, is said to have instigated a PPP parliamentarian to file criminal charges against liberal politicians. And besides his wife, his mother-in-law also brings him negative headlines; recently she was sentenced to one year imprisonment for forgery of a property purchase.
In the polls, Lee and Yoon are almost even, with slight advantages for DP man Lee. But what is particularly striking is the large number of people who, two and a half months before the election, do not like any of the candidates, not even the alternatives from the small opposition parties, the Justice Party and the People’s Party, which have no chance anyway. In a poll by polling institute Gallup Korea, 16 percent of respondents said they would not vote as things stand. In the Korea Times Political scientist Cha Jae-won of the Catholic University of Pusan warns that if things continue like this, “middle and alternate voters could be discouraged from voting”. The result would be a president with little support.
But Lee Jae-myung and Yoon Suk-yeol cannot work without polarization. You are two confident protagonists of the animosity between liberals and conservatives. Lee, 57, comes from a humble background but was still able to study law and became a labor rights advocate. He was mayor of the city of Seongnam near Seoul and from 2018 until his presidential candidacy was governor of South Korea’s most populous Gyeonggi province, which surrounds the capital Seoul like a densely populated belt of bacon. He made a name for himself as a social politician, promises an unconditional basic income, a progressive environmental policy and wants to continue Moon’s course of rapprochement with North Korea.
But as governor, he has already carried out exclusive compulsory PCR tests for foreigners. Has fought with a firm law-and-order mentality against activists who wanted to send balloons with cargo critical of the system to North Korea. And when it comes to gender equality, he has recently been particularly concerned about men.
Yoon wants US nuclear missiles in an emergency
Yoon Suk-yeol, 61, is also a lawyer. He probably tried his hand at law briefly, but found that he is more interested in the indictment than the defense. He became a prosecutor. He led the investigation into the corruption scandal surrounding the convicted and recently pardoned conservative ex-president Park Geun-hye. Under Moon he became attorney general. But then Yoon also investigated Moons then Justice Minister Cho Kuk, who was working on judicial reform against the overwhelming power of partisan prosecutors. Because Yoon wanted to defend his power?
Yoon came into constant conflict with Moon’s government until it suspended him in late 2020. In spring 2021, the reform was implemented and a new authority was created to investigate corruption in the public service. “The spirit of the constitution and the rule of law are crumbling,” said Yoon, and resigned. His fight against the DP government should therefore also have a personal touch. And on the North Korea question, he disagrees entirely. He is in favor of greater protection from the United States, a major ally, and in an emergency even for American nuclear missiles in South Korea.
For now, neither Lee nor Yoon seem particularly statesmanlike. You look like two populists in a clinch. But maybe you will find a more balanced tone before the election. New Year’s Eve is the day of good intentions.