'Trustpolitik' offsets appointment fiasco

President Park Geun-hye returns a salute to a military honor guard during her swearing-in ceremony at the National Assembly in Yeouido on Feb. 25. Behind her are Saenuri Party Chairman Hwang Woo-yea, right, and then Democratic Party interim leader Moon Hee-sang, center.
/ Korea Times file

President's 1st 6 months draw mixed evaluations

By Kim Tae-gyu

President Park Geun-hye, who has just finished her first six months in office, is receiving mixed evaluations for her term so far.

Her start couldn't have been in a worse situation — the daughter of former strongman Park Chung-hee took power amid rising tension due to North Korea's third nuclear test just ahead of her inauguration.

Plus, she failed to complete her Cabinet almost one month into her tenure as a government reorganization bill failed to win National Assembly approval and many of her picks for senior jobs withdrew because of scandals.

Yet, the country's first woman leader has muddled through all the difficulties and managed to make progress on both domestic and international issues, according to political observers.

In particular, consistent with her "trustpolitik" or "trust-building"approach, Park has efficiently dealt with the threats of Pyongyang, which even closed down the inter-Korean joint industrial zone in its border town of Gaeseong.

With Park dead set on not compromising over the Gaeseong Industrial Complex (GIC), the North effectively raised the white flag and the two Koreas agreed to reopen the site in the seventh-round of talks this month.

With inter-Korean relations showing signs of thawing after the springtime madness that was feared to lead to an accidental war, she proposed the reunion of family members separated by the Korean War (1950-53) — for the first time since 2010 — next month, and the North accepted it.

Although she got off to a bad start, her consistency earned her a high approval rate of around 60 percent, which is quite high for presidents half a year after their inauguration.

Former presidential spokesman Yoon Chang-jung, right, and presidential transition team chief Kim Yong-joon prepare for a press meeting at the team's office in Seoul in January. The two weighed on President Park Geun-hye as the former was embroiled in a sex scandal while the latter drew suspicions about his sons' alleged draft dodging.
/ Korea Times file

But Park by no means lacks potential stumbling blocks to hurt her popularity as amply shown by the recent controversies on the ill-fated overhaul to the tax code that angered middle-income wage earners.

The Park administration lost face as it retracted a good part of its original change to the tax regime this month, less than a week after the revision was announced, due to the rising opposition.

The government may soothe the angry public this time around but it is still struggling to find revenue sources to fund Park's various ambitious welfare projects, which are expected to cost 135 trillion won.

Park promised not to raise taxes to finance the programs but a rising number of experts seem to believe that she will have to do so.

In addition, the lingering controversies on the spy agency's alleged interference in last year's presidential election are a big political burden for Park, whose tenure will come to an end in early 2018.

Appointment disappointment

After winning the presidential race by a relatively thin margin, Park and her lieutenants prepared a lot for the inauguration and she was expected to start with great fanfare.

The reality was not the case because many of her candidates for key positions withdrew after scandals such as draft dodging, tax evasion, property speculation and ethical lapses were brought to light.

Most irritating were the dropping-out of prime minister nominee Kim Yong-joon and science minister designate Kim Jeong-hoon after a series of suspicions were attached to them. Many other candidates were forced out for similar reasons.

The nation's unicameral parliament aggravated the situation by not passing the government retooling bill, which stipulated the new ministries wanted by the new administration.

Park managed to fill all the Cabinet members midway through April, over a month after she took the oath.

Fury at Park's appointment culminated in early May when former presidential spokesman Yoon Chang-jung allegedly groped an embassy intern during Park's visit to the United States.

Yoon was Park's first personnel decision after she won the presidential campaign — she appointed him as the spokesman of the transition committee in spite of disputes about his ultra-rightist views.

Park picked him as presidential spokesman without regard to continuing criticism, but Yoon back-stabbed her by being involved in the sexual scandal during her first overseas trip.

She prepared much for the all-important U.S. visit and chalked up substantive results in a summit with U.S. President Barack Obama but the feats were overshadowed by the unprecedented scandal.

Yoon was fired and his superior, former chief press secretary Lee Nam-ki, also quit.

Inter-Korean relations

There have also been many other external headaches including North Korea and Japan.

The North carried out a nuclear test on Feb. 12, two weeks before the official launch of the Park administration despite strong criticism and warnings from the international community.

The U.N. countered with very stringent restrictions, which even the North's only benefactor China signed onto. The North countered with verbal assaults and threatened nuclear attacks on the South and the U.S.

In April, Pyongyang even pulled 53,000 workers from the GIC, the last symbol of inter-Korean engagement, for the first time since its opening in 2004. Park responded by withdrawing all South Korean managers there.

Against this backdrop, inter-Korean relations under the Park administration were feared to repeat those of her predecessor Lee Myung-bak, whose five years were all about inter-Korean conflict and acrimony.

Lee stopped almost all projects with the North with the sole exception of the GIC and cut off the free-flowing aid initiated by the two late liberal Presidents Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun.

With Lee in office, the two Koreas failed to find any middle ground and in this climate, the North attacked the South twice — sinking the frigate Cheonan and shelling the border island of Yeonpyeong claiming 50 lives in total including two civilians.

The two tragedies took place in 2009. Pyongyang claims responsibility for the latter but not the former, refuting the results of investigations by a multinational team headed by Seoul.

After the two sides held six rounds of talks on reopening the GIC to little avail, Seoul made a "final" proposal to have make-or-break negotiations last month but Pyongyang remained silent.

The South appeared to be ready to close the zone once and for all as it announced it would pay out insurance claims to the 123 Southern companies working in the North's No. 3 city.

The North abruptly accepted almost all the requests of the South, so the two rivals met two weeks ago to iron out most of the differences to agree on the reactivation of the GIC.

Watchers believe the cash-strapped regime could not give up the stable source of hard currency offered by the GIC.

Park tried to move one step further by instantly proposing bolder schemes like a peace park in the heavily-fortified demilitarized zone and the resumption of family reunions starting next month in time for the Chuseok holiday, Korean Thanksgiving.

The two Koreas agreed to hold the reunions from Sept. 25 to 30 at the Mt. Geumgang resort where 100 families will be able to meet from each side. Plus, video reunions will take place in late October for 40 families from each side.

Experts say Park successfully positioned her administration somewhere between the supplier of unrequited aid for the North under the former leftist governments and the hard-line of the Lee government.

She also maintained a good relationship with China, the long-time ally of North Korea — Park flew to Beijing in June to meet and build rapport with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

"As far as the North Korea policies are concerned, I have to admit that Park has done well," Prof. Son Tae-gyu at Dankook University said. "Her trademark North Korea policies geared toward building trust has worked in a handsome fashion."

Such an approach, titled the "trust process," refers to a carrot-and-stick strategy trying to reach out to the North without tolerating its provocations.

Initially, it was regarded not that different from the Lee administration's hawkish stance but Park has shown her willingness to engage North Korea in spite of its recalcitrance.

The aforementioned efforts helped Park regain her popularity — her approval ratings have moved in the vicinity of 60 percent over the past few months but pundits say that there are many potential stumbling blocks like economic policies and the sprayed relationship with Japan.

Another ticking time bomb is the dispute involving the National Intelligence Service, which is accused of having meddled in last year's presidential election by getting its agents to post online messages critical of opposition candidates.

Opposition parties vow to go all-out to get to the bottom of the case. Although Park has iterated that she has nothing to do with the suspicions, she might experience setbacks under a worst-case scenario.

This month, Park's economic team faced big problems after they announced a revision to the tax code to affect wage earners whose annual income is more than 34.5 million won ($31,000).

The step ended up generating anger among salaried employees, who already believe that they are shouldering too much of a tax burden compared to the self-employed.

The Ministry of Strategy and Finance had to cancel most of its plans but it is just a makeshift measure because the government has to find ways to finance Park's welfare policies that will cost 135 trillion won.

To keep Park's presidential campaign pledge of not to increase taxes to fund them, the finance ministry said that it would cut expenditure by 84 trillion won over the next five years while cranking up revenue of 51 trillion won through non-traditional tax routes.

But the idea seemingly lacks viability, analysts said.

"The consensus is that the government will not be able to secure 135 trillion won without tax hikes. It may have to jack up taxes," said Prof. Kim Ky-won at the Korea National Open University.

Another ticking time bomb is the dispute involving the National Intelligence Service, which is accused of having meddled in last year's presidential election by getting its agents to post online messages critical of opposition candidates.

Opposition parties vow to go all-out to get to the bottom of the case. Although Park has iterated that she has nothing to do with the suspicions, she might experience setbacks under a worst-case scenario.

Currently, few take issue with the legitimacy of Park but if investigations reveal fresh facts negative to Park's side, she could suffer setbacks.

Japan is another pending issue with its leaders tilting toward an ultra-rightist path headed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who defended his ministers' visit to the Yasukuni Shrine that houses the remains of 14 Class-A war criminals.

He even negated its past misdeeds ahead of and during World War II, angering the country's neighbors, especially wartime victims Korea and China.

Park has said that Japan is a significant neighbor but she is not likely to visit it in the near future because of the present diplomatic tension despite Abe's recent requests to do so.

"It is another tall task to deal with Japan as the country is likely to continue its march to the right. Park will have to think about appropriate ways to cope with it," said a Seoul analyst who asked not to be named.