By Kyle Van Horn
There seem to be many ``first-time-in-years" events happening in Korea these days. It's no coincidence that they began to snowball in frequency upon the election of conservative President Lee Myung-bak and his administration.
Almost immediately after taking office, President Lee announced plans to privatize and scale back state-owned enterprises. In January, he reiterated this promise in his nationally televised New Year's address despite growing public concern about the inevitable setbacks that will come with such privatizations.
In the coming years, as these privatizations take hold, Korean citizens are certain to see price hikes coupled with diminishing quality of services that many people now take for granted.
Last summer, the highly publicized candlelight protests over the potential ratification of the KORUS FTA ― and namely the importation of U.S. beef ― ended abruptly when the Lee administration decided enough was enough and mobilized thousands of riot police to crush the protests. Korea is now the largest importer of U.S. beef worldwide.
Later, a wave of celebrity suicides occurred, which was supposedly brought on by rumors spread online by Korea's ``netizens." In turn, the Korean government hastily moved to put new regulations into place that would significantly limit the anonymity and freedom of speech of citizens on the Internet.
Park Dae-sung, an unemployed Korean blogger better known as ``Minerva." was the first high-profile victim of the new Internet laws. After posting comments about the pending economic disaster and then turning out to be accurate with most of his predictions, Park was arrested for allegedly destabilizing currency markets and hurting Korea's international credibility.
In other words, the Korean government used its newly implemented Internet laws to create a scapegoat for its own economic mismanagement. Park faces a jail term of up to five years or a fine of up to 50 million won or $37,000.
Next, in 2009, government plans to demolish areas of Seoul in order to construct newer, more expensive housing and office buildings met with fierce objection from the people residing in these areas. Compensation packages for small-business owners and residents were considered far too low, so a sit-in was organized at one of the construction sites. The Seoul police and SWAT were mobilized immediately. The conflict, known infamously now as the ``Yongsan incident," resulted in six deaths. Reconstruction resumes, nevertheless.
A month ago, human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, urged Korea not to implement the death penalty for the first time in 10 years. Koreans are still highly emotional about alleged serial killer Kang Ho-sun, who confessed to killing eight women over the past four years. President Lee faces a tough decision about whether to resume the practice of capital punishment after Amnesty declared that Korea was ``in practice" an abolitionist country, as it had not executed anyone for 10 years.
This week, Amnesty's focus again falls on Korea, this time after the first arrest of a journalist since the late 1990s. The arrest came after union members of a Korean cable television news network, YTN, went on strike, refusing to accept the appointment of new president Koo Bon-hong. Koo is an associate and former media advisor to Lee Myung-bak.
The implications are obvious. The media is meant to be an unbiased institution with the primary objective of the unbiased coverage of local, national, and global events and objectively criticizing elected officials. With the appointment of Koo, YTN's capacity to remain impartial has become seriously limited.
``It's been a long time since the Korean media has faced this type of unwarranted government interference and harassment," said Roseann Rife, deputy director of Amnesty International's Asia-Pacific Program. ``These arrests violate the right to freedom of assembly and the freedom of the press and constitute a very worrying development for the South Korean media."
Individually, each of the topics above can be, and often are, argued over by people on opposite sides of the political spectrum. Collectively, however, one cannot help but notice a frightening trend occurring on the Korean Peninsula.
Since the beginning of 2008, the Korean public has clashed with the Korean government time after time, each incident resulting in a clear victory for the latter. Despite growing public outcry, this trend shows no signs of slowing. The last time I checked, a democracy is a government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives.
Sixteen months ago, Lee Myung-bak was elected by the Korean people in a landslide victory. For the first time in years, though, the voices of the Korean people are not being heard. For the first time in years, the wants and needs of the Korean people often go unconsidered by their elected officials.
For the first time in years, local media and private citizens are gradually being stripped of their rights of free speech and assembly. For the first time in years, one has to wonder, what will be the next headline that contains this scary phrase?
The author is a freelance writer and activist for Venceremos Solidarity Network (www.venceremosonline.org).