By Cho Jae-hyon
City Editor
“Rain is falling and mother is getting married,” was tweeted by Kim Tae-ho just hours after the former prime minister-nominee offered to step down over corruption allegations at parliamentary confirmation hearings.
It was a variation on a quotation by Mao Zedong, the founder of modern communist China. Mao uttered the line after he found out that his designated successor Lin Biao was involved in a failed plot to kill him and trying to flee to the Soviet Union.
The line means one cannot keep the rain from falling and prevent one’s mother from marrying. It’s a metaphor for a helpless state one cannot change no matter how hard he or she tries.
The short message Kim posted on his Twitter account pointedly summed up his miserable situation. His Twitter timeline hasn’t been updated since the metaphorical message.
As shown in Kim’s case, Twitter is emerging as an important social networking vehicle for politicians. Especially, for those who harbor ambition to rule the country, it is a sort of must.
On top of many young, tech-savvy lawmakers, older-generation politicians are becoming tweeters.
President Lee Myung-bak has also become one, opening an account (@bluehouseKorea) on Aug. 13. Lee himself typed some lines on the first day. Since then, his secretaries are tweeting away on his behalf. Understandably, he is too busy to chat directly with his more than 23,000 followers.
Who else is active in this social media? Park Geun-hye, the former chairwoman of the ruling Grand National Party and the obvious frontrunner in the party’s next presidential election nomination competition, boasts nearly 40,000 followers. Among opposition lawmakers, Chung Dong-young, former unification minister and chief of the Democratic Party, is actively communicating online with his 18,500 followers.
Obviously, the Twitter bandwagon is something politicians can’t miss out on. It is providing them with a boundless digital realm where they can communicate with or woo voters.
Twitter is all about communication. Korean politicians are notoriously bad at this. President Lee has been criticized for the lack of communication. Absent in his ruling style are efforts to communicate with the people over key state affairs. It appears that he even does not talk much with ruling party members.
That’s why he surprises the public with unproven ideas such as a“unification tax” and had to eat his words. The latest bungled cabinet reshuffle also reflects his “going-my-way” leadership.
His reluctance to communicate is causing a lot of trouble. Entering the second half of his five-year term last week, Lee said he will put a policy priority on boosting communication, attaining national unity and creating a fair society.
However, chances of his delivering on these promises don’t look that bright. He rarely communicates with the public. He hardly talks to the press. He has held no press conferences of late. In the earlier days of his presidency, he held several press conferences. But even at that time, he hardly gave Q&A sessions.
The only communication he has with the people is his biweekly radio address. But it’s not a proper form of communication as it is only one-way.
It seems that Lee, the typical I-decide-and-you-follow style leader, doesn’t listen to other people.
Lee appointed Cho Hyun-ho, who has accused the late former President Roh Moo-hyun of having created a slush fund, as commissioner of the National Policy Agency. In his inauguration speech, Cho also emphasized the importance of communication, promising to become a police chief who is willing to communicate.
Even though he managed to grab the post, Cho’s fate is hanging by a thread. If the prosecution fails to find any borrowed-name accounts opened by Roh, the commissioner will have to quit. He said he will step down if his accusation against Roh is proved to be false by the prosecution. In that case, it will deal another blow to President Lee who has already suffered a major setback due to the botched cabinet reshuffle.
Who will fill the void for the premiership is uncertain. If Kim, 47, were appointed, he would have been the nation’s youngest prime minister in decades. He was a relatively active Twitterer. It does not necessarily mean that he is good at communicating.
Still, it’s true that a growing number of politicians will embrace the social networking tool as it will be an effective tool to help boost communication with the public. Despite some downsides, Twitter will emerge as a crucial ingredient in determining winners in the next presidential and general elections. Those who have taken to Twitter better than their rivals may have better chances.
Even reclusive North Korea has opened a Twitter account. How about President Lee and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il following each other on Twitter and discussing ways to ease tension on the Korean Peninsula?
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