By Kang Seung-woo
A court plans to hold a lottery later this week for seats in the first formal hearing of the jailed former President Lee Myung-bak.
According to the Seoul Central District Court, Monday, it will select those who will be allowed to attend Lee's first trial hearing, scheduled for May 23, through a ticket raffle.
Lee, who served as president from 2008 to 2013, has been behind bars since March 22 on 16 charges of corruption, including receiving bribes from businesses and creating a slush fund.
The court where Lee will testify accommodates 150 people. Other than designated seats for involved parties and reporters, the remainder will be up for grabs for the public.
On-site registration will be held Wednesday at the Seoul Bankruptcy Court from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m., and those interested in attending the hearing must bring their ID cards or driver's licenses.
Lottery winners will be informed by text message and their names will also be posted on the court's website.
Admission tickets to the trial will be distributed 30 minutes ahead of the hearing at the court entrance -- although it has yet to be decided when the trial will start.
The schedule will be posted on the court's website as soon as it is fixed.
To receive admission tickets, raffle winners will have to bring their application coupons as well as ID cards.
The admission tickets are not transferrable and they have to keep them until the end of the hearing.
In the hearing for the impeached President Park Geun-hye, held last May, 521 people flocked to the court to enter the lottery for 68 seats in the public gallery, posting a competition rate of 7.7:1. It was also Park's first public appearance following her imprisonment.
The 76-year-old Lee is faced with two key criminal charges of taking 11 billion won ($10.3 million) in bribes from the state-run spy agency and various businesses, including Samsung Electronics, between 2007 and 2012, and embezzling 35 billion won from the auto parts firm DAS, which he is said to secretly own, between 1994 and 2006.
However, Lee's side has denied all allegations.
Lee has become the nation's fourth former president to face a criminal trial for corruption, following Park's indictment in 2017. The other two were Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tae-woo.
Since the prosecution's investigation was started in January, Lee and his aides have denounced it as “political revenge” by the Moon Jae-in administration for the death of former President Roh Moo-hyun, who committed suicide after becoming embroiled in a corruption investigation under the Lee government.