Teflon

On June 3, Korea will pick its next president. We already know that this president won't be a woman, because the nation returned to its usual 'manel' mode:

'Cherchez la femme'... 8 candidates, 8 men.

We also already know that this president will be LEE Jae-myung, bar some last minute surprise. LEE is not running any risks, behind a bulletproof jacket that has become a marketing gimmick ever since he wore one when summoned to court (look, I'm not a bad guy, I survived an assassination attempt, remember*?). 

There is no way PPP candidate KIM Moon-soo can catch up with his rival. Not because he failed to unite with LEE Jun-seop (a blessing in disguise: that toxic mysoginist would have torpedoed him like he almost sunk YOON Suk-yeol three years ago), but because he refused to unite with HAN Duck-soo, which doesn't look good when you aim at uniting a nation.

HAN Duck-soo could have defeated LEE. Like YOON in 2022, less for his own qualities than for the defaults of his rival. HAN would have easily collected the votes of never-LJM democrats: he wasn't the power hungry extremist LEE tried to depict; just a dull civil servant who put country over party, and also worked for KIM Dae-jung and ROH Moo-hyun.

Come to think of it, neither of the two leading candidates should be in this race today. KIM because HAN was not a political animal but a reluctant, suicidal candidate, and LEE because he was ruled guilty of an offense that should prevent him from running for five years, but the Supreme Court didn't go all the way and declare him ineligible. 

The institution simply stated that LEE was guilty and that the Seoul court had to change its ruling accordingly, blaming it on the way for many irregularities. Of course, that partisan court, which already drew criticism and an overrule for the way it dealt with YOON, postponed its own decision until the last moment, did nothing to fix its own misdeeds before the election. 

So just like TRUMP, Teflon LEE will survive a major judicial blow and cruise to victory. But this taint remains particularly embarrassing, and his teams already suggested a few extreme ways of removing it. Among others:

• create a new law to cancel ongoing cases against a newly elected president (his legislative majority already carved many exotic laws over the past years, but even TRUMP 1.0 couldn't pull that one)
• impeach the head of the Supreme Court
• double the number of Supreme Court justices (!)
• ending the Separation of Powers, a keystone of democracy 
• ... 

Not the best way to mend a nation traumatized by 'Martial Law' YOON Suk-yeol... The word 'dictatorship' has even been used to describe what Korea could become under an almighty LEE, should he prolong his legislative overreach of the past few years. Once elected, will he let bygones be bygones, or will he double down and go full TRUMP? Of course, LJM is much smarter and less egotistical than DJT, but there's little chance he will reduce a grip on justice he's been trying to strengthen for years. Korea has been in a constitutional crisis since 2020, and the balance of power is at stake.

Like for all his predecessors, LEE Jae-myung will have a right to make mistakes, but not on the fundamentals of democracy. This nation can't afford one more screw up (well that's what I wrote before the previous elections; and look what happened).

Of course, we'll also see how LEE will handle other hot potatoes such as:

• the economy: more business savvy and less ideological than MOON on the issue, LEE remains a populist, but there's no coffer left to plunder
• demographics: for the first time in a while, the national birthrate ticked up in 2024 - was it a flash in the pan? can Koreans grow more confident in these troubled times?
• North Korea: charged for instructing illegal transfers to Pyongyang and heading a party that suppressed laws against foreign spies, LEE will probably reach out across the DMZ. Also likely to step back from the close collaboration with Japan and the USA (which would profit China, even if he's not pitching that tune ahead of the elections).
• TRUMP: the anti-US LEE could get along very well with The Donald, and that's not paradoxical since DJT himself is pretty much anti-America. Furthermore, these two highly transactional people who totally reshaped their own parties to their image can find lucrative common ground. Expect fewer US troops in the peninsula.

Anyway, whoever wins, his predecessor YOON Suk-yeol will soon, along with his wife KIM Keon-hee, have more facetime with justice. Even though, the disgraced president managed to invite himself in the campaign by attending the projection of a conspiracy theory film about election fraud... 

Won't Korea's tragic comedy ever end? 

Seoul Village 2025
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* see 'Assassination attempt on LEE Jae-myung in Busan'

Gwanghwamun Square Enters Third Dimension

Seoul Metropolitan Government and the Cultural Heritage Administration unveiled yesterday their plans for a 'New Gwanghwamun Square' by 2021, and they came up with a weird 'solution' for the potential traffic conundrum I mentioned four years ago, when the project started taking a clearer shape (see "Gwanghwamun, Donhwamun, and the Tale of two Royal Roads").

Gwanghwamun Square 3.0 - the royal Sejongno-Gwanghwamun-Gyeongbokgung-Cheong Wa Dae-Bugaksan-Bukhansan perspective

This modification of Seoul's most defining center has potentially even greater consequences than the previous one, which we followed step by step a decade ago. I will as usual focus on the urbanistic impacts (passing by many familiar spots), but since this is also about Korea's center of power ever since its capital was founded, I'd better start with some political context.

It's the politics, stupid?

Such a project deserves to be carried by both the local (SMG) and national (CHA) governments, and PARK Won-soon as well as MOON Jae-in happen to have a special bond with a site where PARK Geun-hye started and ended her presidency.

Started? If we all remember the massive, peaceful demonstrations that led to PGH's destitution, who could possibly forget that kitschissime wishtree** on Gwanghwamun Square, her first symbolic stop on her way to Cheong Wa Dae?

During his own campaign, MOON Jae-in pledged to move the presidential offices from Cheong Wa Dae to Sejongno, and the presidential residence closer to Gwanghwamun, in order to cleanse the feet of Bugaksan, and to honor the place where democracy took a stand and won. MOON also picked Gwanghwamun Square to celebrate his victory.

Retrospectively, I shudder when I remember AHN Hee-jung's over-the-top cheering that night - back then, I didn't know he couldn't even control his darkest pulsions... anyway, his DSK / #metoo moment completely revived the ambitions of a man who tried to steal the show on the very same night.

Only weeks ago, PARK Won-soon was clearly out of the game for the 2022 presidential elections, and about to be dumped by his own party for the upcoming mayoral elections (June 2018). Now he's leading the polls by far (against WOO Sang-ho and PARK Young-sun for the primaries, and against AHN Cheol-soo and KIM Moon-soo beyond), and this new project looks like the ideal platform for both ballots: he can make a splash in 2018 on the very site that boosted his predecessor's reelection***, and deliver the goods just months before 2022. Of course, PWS already combined a major urban project with a major political event before, but PGH's impeachment derailed Seoullo 7017's perfect timing ahead of the 2017 elections (see "Seoullo 7017, and more roads to Seoul").

Now is the right moment to communicate a grand scheme and vision, big enough to mask PARK's most recent shortcomings: he barely managed to avoid criticism for Seoul's waste management crisis by sending deputies to face the media, and he let his rival WOO preempt the usually well coveted 'public transportation' territory by campaigning on a new metropolitan authority, including yet another revival of the key Seobuseon project (after 2013, when "Seobu Line confirmed as Seoul's LRT top priority", the city dropped the ball once again).

So yes, it's about politics. But regardless of this context, Gwanghwamun Square and its surroundings needed a fix.

3.7 times bigger, 3.7 times better?

So what's the plan? Basically, the pedestrian zone grows not only, as expected, to the West and along nearby streets, but also right in front of the gate, making the road map much more complex, what I dubbed Seoul's 'Royal T'**** turning into a Y:

Seoul also revived its old ambition to restore Baekundongcheon, Cheonggyecheon's main source, the diagonal still visible on today's map (see "Baekundongcheon / Gwanghwamun-gil - A River Runs Through It"*****).

Seoul city advertises about the 3.7 factor by which pedestrian surface booms from 18,840 m2 to 69,300 m2, the reduction of traffic lanes to 6 along Sejong-daero, and its renewed demands to the State for a GTX extension to Gwanghwamun.

All this sounds very positive and environment friendly, but no really new green spaces are planned, and the extended square might make Summers and Winters even more merciless in what looks more like Tiananmen Square, or the barren landing site that preceded Yeouido Park.

There are still no dedicated lanes for buses or bicycles, and buses shall be redirected South, which seems recipe for disaster for public transportation around downtown Seoul, particularly since the new road map deprives Sajik-ro 8-gil (formerly Naejadong-gil) from its role of main NS/EW dispatcher.

Compared to Gwanghwamun 2.0, the 2009 revolution that brought pedestrians back to the heart of the capital, this Gwanghwamun 3.0 adds only marginal change to their experience. I like the idea of restoring the 'parvis' in front of Gwanghwamun, the Eastern pavillions and hanok around a 'History Square' that could liven up the walk from Seochon to Bukchon... but pushing traffic further downtown, and adding new bottlenecks to already saturated axes does seem like a big price to pay. 

Unfortunately, like with Seoullo, impact surveys have obviously been eluded in a race to meet electoral deadlines, and authorities chose to worsen traffic situations by not tackling them. Even the curve of the new road following the back of the central government building (that by the way shouldn't be on that History Square) tells about quick and dirty fixes without consideration for the big picture.

What Seoul needed was a consistent vision and plan to prepare its whole historic center Sadeamun (intra muros) for a driverless future. What Seoul delivered was a dangerously incomplete, short-sighted, ill-prepared PR stunt.

The city will take one year to select a proposal, start work in January 2020, and finish by EOY 2021. Mayor PARK missed by a few months last time, and 2021 seems safe enough a goal for him to inauguration the new (if not improved) Gwanghwamun Square. 

I sincerely hope he'll reconsider this plan, and grow some ambition for our city.

Seoul Village 2018
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* see "The Anipang Election: Park wins big, but who won?"
** see "Park 2 Day 1 in pictures"
*** will OH Se-hoon rise again (on billboards, at least - see "OH Se-hoon returns... but did he ever leave?")
**** see "Inwangsan's Great Wall and Seoul's Royal "T" Time"
***** note that since my 2009 focus, the streets West of Sejong-daero have been renamed Saemunan-ro 9-gil and Saemunan-ro 5ga-gil. Seoul also renewed the project of highlighting walls around Sajik-dan and Sajik-park.

25 years later

On December 19, 2012, South Korea will elect the 6th president of its 6th republic in a one-round vote that usually gathers a dozen candidates, many of whom seem apparently artificially cast just to divide the ballots among opponents.


The recently* rebranded conservative and liberal parties (respectively Saenuri and DUP) will pick their champions by the end of september. But if PARK Geun-hye remains the favorite for the Saenuri (even if CHUNG Mong-joon or Gyeonggi-do governor KIM Moon-soo may give it a shot), HAN Myeong-sook seems to have lost her chances as the DUP candidate following the April 11 debacle, when Saenuri secured a comfortable legislative majority (confirming the lack of consistency of an opposition at this stage unfit to govern). MOON Jae-in, the actual ROH Moo-hyun political heir, jumped in with genuine chances of changing the game. AHN Cheol-Soo? The maverick is still weighing the pros and cons of a dive in the shark pool of Korean politics.

I've already mentioned the unsound balance of powers in Korea, where the president may have less influence than the head of a major chaebol because he becomes a lame duck as soon as he is elected: ROH Tae-woo, KIM Young-sam, KIM Dae-jung, ROH Moo-hyun, and LEE Myung-bak served only one term each, a limit meant to prevent the country from falling back into dictatorship. In this unicameral system, the assembly has the reputation of a UFC ring, and the political debate is at best non-existent, at worst a sick revival of the 1950s between hardcore conservatives and pro-NK activists. And if he independence of justice and media is often challenged, netizens are much more powerful and influential than in most countries. Thus a recurring temptation for the government to tame online media, a universe where, as a matter of fact, hoaxes can be more easily found than truths.


Note that South Korea ranks 44th in the 2011-2012 Press Freedom Index (Reporters Sans Frontieres), between Botswana and Comoros. Better than North Korea, of course (178th), but also better than the USA (47th). Yet the situation worsened since 2006 (31st), with a peak in 2009 (69th), the year that followed the candlelight vigil demonstrations.


So where does South Korea stand as a democracy? Here's the verdict according to Amnesty International's 2011 report: "The government increasingly used vaguely worded national security, defamation and other laws to harass and suppress its critics. In February, the Constitutional Court ruled that the death penalty did not violate the Constitution. In October and November, the Court conducted hearings on whether restrictions on migrant workers’ labour mobility, and military conscription without options for conscientious objection, constituted violations of fundamental rights."

In this context, a minority of ultra-conservatives may see an opportunity to copy the Japanese model, where the whole political system is crippled by revisionists, and where in spite of an overwhelmingly peaceful population, a handful of hatemongers has the power to take down governments at will. Emboldened by the recent scandals about pro-NK representatives within opposition members, they keep launching provocative trial balloons**.

So a quarter of a century after the 1987 revision of the constitution, South Korea seems to be at a major political crossroads. The voice of moderates is almost inaudible, and this is the most crucial moment when key values must be protected.


Which values? Well, they are at the preamble of the constitution, a document that can be downloaded in English on the Constitutional Court's website***:


"We, the people of Korea, proud of a resplendent history and traditions dating from time immemorial, upholding the cause of the Provisional Republic of Korea Government born of the March First Independence Movement of 1919 and the democratic ideals of the April Nineteenth Uprising of 1960 against injustice, having assumed the mission of democratic reform and peaceful unification of our homeland and having determined to consolidate national unity with justice, humanitarianism and brotherly love, and
To destroy all social vices and injustice, and
To afford equal opportunities to every person and provide for the fullest development of individual capabilities in all fields, including political, economic, social and cultural life by further strengthening the basic free and democratic order conducive to private initiative and public harmony, and
To help each person discharge those duties and responsibilities concomitant to freedoms and rights, and
To elevate the quality of life for all citizens and contribute to lasting world peace and the common prosperity of mankind and thereby to ensure security, liberty and happiness for ourselves and our posterity forever,
Do hereby amend, through national referendum following a resolution by the National Assembly, the Constitution, ordained and established on the Twelfth Day of July anno Domini Nineteen hundred and forty-eight, and amended eight times subsequently.
Oct.29, 1987"

So look for candidates who seek "democratic reform and peaceful unification", candidates who want to "consolidate national unity with justice, humanitarianism and brotherly love", "to contribute to lasting world peace and the common prosperity of mankind", respecting not only "private initiative" but also "public harmony".

Find out how candidates interpret "to destroy all social vices" or "the basic free and democratic order", expose the impostures, see who really wants to protect the constitution, and see who really contributes to a clearer, sounder, more responsible and more respectful national debate.

Way to go.

Seoul Village 2012
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* see "Saenuri, a brand "new" wor(l)d"
** see "State-condoned creationism in Korea? A cold-blooded murder against King Sejong", "Still no apology from MBC, and more provocations on the Chinese front"...
*** http://english.ccourt.go.kr/home/att_file/download/Constitution_of_the_Republic_of_Korea.pdf (in Korean: http://www.ccourt.go.kr/home/information/low02_list.jsp?gubun=21 )