Tragic stories of the Park family continue
By Choi Ha-young
.jpg?w=728)
Park Geun-hye, then 27, leaves Cheong Wa Dae, Nov. 21, 1979, following her father President Park Chung-hee’s assassination. / Yonhap
Park Geun-hye will unwillingly leave Cheong Wa Dae for the second time in her life, following the Constitutional Court’s decision to unseat her, Friday.
As the daughter of then-President Park Chung-hee (1917-1979), who took power through a coup, she spent her childhood as a “princess” in the presidential residence. But her tragedy started with her mother’s death.
In the middle of the Cold War, her mother, Yuk Young-soo, was shot dead by an assassin in 1974, allegedly on the orders of a pro-North Korean organization based in Japan to kill her father. Replacing her mother, Park, 22, had to quit her studies in France and was summoned by her father to act as “first lady.”
Five years later, her father was assassinated by his right-hand man Kim Jae-gyu, then director of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, during a drinking party. “It was a revolution to revive liberal democracy that Park destroyed. Citizens, please fully enjoy the democracy,” Kim said in his final argument before being sentenced to death.
The dictator’s rule was nightmarish for pro-democracy fighters. Park changed the Constitution into his “Yushin” theory, in 1972 to pave the way for him to remain in power.
Under the dictatorship, numerous political opponents were persecuted. By fabricating the People’s Revolution Party Incident in 1974, the dictator killed seven citizens only 18 hours after they were given the death sentence, in order to quell the discontent of the people.
Her isolation after her parents’ deaths heralded another tragedy ― the deeper relationship with Choi Soon-sil. Before entering into politics in 1997, Park built up a wall around herself, possibly due to the trauma she experienced.
The unmarried Park, notorious for her closed mind, did not keep in touch with her siblings.
A visitor looks at portraits of former President Park Geun-hye’s parents ― Park Chung-hee and Yuk Young-soo ― displayed at his birthplace in Gumi, North Gyeongsang Province, Friday. / Yonhap
Family feud
Due to her family background, she was given the nickname, “The Strongman’s Daughter” right after being elected president in 2012, by Time magazine.
Contrary to the expectations of the people to be the cleanest leader without corruption involving her family, the lonely President was bogged down by an influence-peddling scandal involving her confidant Choi.
Her “incompetence” in dealing with the Sewol ferry disaster, in which 304, mostly young students, died, kept haunting her. In the end, the scandal ― dotted with drugs, plastic surgery, bribery and pseudo religion ― ignited the people’s anger. Her reputation was tarnished by the suspicious relationship with Choi’s father, the pseudo-pastor Choi Tae-min.
Mysterious deaths constantly occurred around Park. The Yookyoung Foundation, established by her mother, has been at the center of friction between Park’s younger brother, Ji-man and younger sister, Geun-ryeong.
The younger siblings claimed that the Choi family exerted their power arbitrarily through the older Park who headed the foundation. “Please save our sister from being fooled by Choi Tae-min,” her younger brother and sister said in a letter to then-President Roh Tae-woo.
Amid lingering conflicts, Park Geun-hye didn’t show up at her sister’s wedding in 2008. From 1989 to 2002, Ji-man was caught six times and arrested five times, for using drugs and prostitutes.
Park’s family life turned uglier after Geun-ryeong’s husband Shin Dong-wook exposed a “murder” allegedly engineered by Ji-man in 2007. Park’s relatives Yong-cheol and Yong-soo, who were allegedly involved in an attempted killing of Shin, were found dead in 2011. Those who testified or looked into the incident also met untimely deaths.
Park’s last moment as the nation’s leader was not so beautiful. On the day of the final ruling on her impeachment, two elderly pro-Park protesters died. Now, closing her and her father’s era filled with humiliation, a civilian, Park Geun-hye is awaiting a prosecution investigation and the judgment of history.