[Column] Yoon must learn from the founding president

Lee Ha-kyung
The author is a senior columnist for the JoongAng Ilbo.

Great political leaders could be misunderstood if they are judged in the contemporary context, as their courageous battles over flimsy populism could be overlooked. The student activists who had served a prison sentence for their fight against former president Syngman Rhee for “autocracy” visited his grave, bowed low for their “misunderstanding” of the founding president and acknowledged his “bigger achievements.” It took 63 years for their historical reconciliation and reappraisal of the former president.

The first and last president of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, who fought hard for the independence of the country, contributed to the founding of South Korea. The landmark reform of transforming a majority of tenant farmers into self-employed farmers had been “the first-ever economic democratization,” said former Sogang University vice president Lee Chang-kyu. Rhee had defended the country and democracy from communist North Korea. He struck the Mutual Defense Treaty with the United States after a surprise release of North Korean POWs who opposed communism. Rhee set the foundation for industrialization to strengthen the economy and prevent another war. Stigmatizing him simply as a right-wing politician friendly to the U.S. and antagonist toward Japan comes from sheer ignorance and narrow perspectives.

The founding president even used his fall from grace to bolster the fragile democracy of the country. The 86-year-old president visited students who got injured during their protest against him. “People who sit quietly against injustice are dead people. This country has hope,” he said as he resigned himself from the presidency upon public wishes. At the time, the U.S. ambassador to Seoul referred to him "Korea’s George Washington." Former lawmaker Lee Yong-il, imprisoned during his college days at Seoul National University (SNU), paid tribute to his grave and withdrew his reference to him as a dictator.

Former president Lee Myung-bak received thousands of letters from young people while in prison. A high school senior from Gwangju apologized for believing him to be a bad president based on the description from his teacher, who had rallied against him during the mad cow scare protests. The student praised the former president for “great achievements.” Lee was chosen as the most respected president in a poll of SNU students after retirement.

Foreign Minister Park Jin delivers a commemorative speech on the 148th birthday of the late president Syngman Rhee at Ihwajang House, a private residence of the founding president. [NEWS1]

President Yoon Suk Yeol, who succeeds the conservative heritage of Rhee and Lee, is being questioned for his leadership ahead of his first year in office. The approval rating of the president and his People Power Party (PPP) has been skidding as they fall out with public sentiment. Ahn Cheol-soo and Lee Jun-seok, popular centrist-conservative names in the capital region, also are retreating. Newly elected PPP Chair Kim Gi-hyeon and floor leader Yun Jae-ok are both from South and North Gyeongsang, a conservative voting base. The back-to-the-old-days pivot would lose voters from the capital region, young people and centrists, eventually leading to a defeat in the parliamentary elections next April.

Far-right pastor Jun Kwang-hoon has entered the picture to make matters worse. He had marshaled the rallies of the so-called Taegeuk-ki army — an ultraconservative group of people — to bring about the crushing defeat for the conservative party in the last parliamentary election by joining hands with former party head Hwang Kyo-ahn. Priest Jun has reminded Yoon’s loyalists — PPP senior member Kim Jae-won and PPP Chair Kim Gi-hyeon — that he was behind their ascension to power by having his followers support them. He bluntly asked them what they would give him in return if he delivered 200 seats for the PPP which currently has 115 seats in the 300-member legislature. They promised the pastor that he would get what he wants.

The deal looks ludicrous. But it actually has essence, given the sudden change of party convention rule. Jun’s followers joined the party as members with voting rights. The PPP changed the party leadership election rules before the convention on March 8 to completely rely on party members’ votes instead of the previous 30 percent reserved for outside public polls. As a result, the party has become more and more distant from the public. Kim, a member of the Supreme Council of the party, publicly declared that he opposes reflecting the spirit of the May 18 Gwangju Democratization Movement in 1980 in the preface of our Constitution. North Korean defector-turned-lawmaker Thae Yong-ho claimed that the April 3 Jeju uprising in 1948 was instigated by North Korean founder Kim Il Sung. The governor of Gangwon from the PPP went to his routine golf practice when a wildfire was raging in his province, and the governor of North Chungcheong went for an after-work drinking while wildfires were also raging in his province.

Former prosecutor general-turned-president Yoon has been doing all he can. He broke the ice with Japan through the disputed idea of compensating wartime forced labor victims with a third-party fund. The president is pushing unpopular reforms in the labor, pension and education sectors. But because of the old school’s command in the PPP, the new guy cannot move forward. He visited Daegu — the home turf of Korean conservatism — but could not stop the party’s crushing defeat in the recent by-elections. The president should have realized that he had to represent the entire country, not a certain voting base.

Former president Lee shifted his attention to working people and practical policy after his rating sank amid the spread of fake news about mad cow disease. He recruited progressive figures like SNU president Chung Un-chan and former Board of Audit and Inspection head Kim Hwang-sik as prime ministers. Thanks to such effort, his approval rating shot up above 40 percent.

The PPP must pay heed to the re-evaluation of former presidents Rhee and Lee. There is still time to make amends. As President Yoon owes nothing to anyone in the party, he must use that merit in running the country. He must break out of the political ghetto the party is confining itself to.