Chun, Roh pose problems for Kim

The South Korean Supreme Court's rejection of the final appeals for clemency by two former presidents ends the legal case against them, but it opens up some difficult political calculations over what remains a deeply divisive issue in Korea. Jakarta Post Asia correspondent Harvey Stockwin takes a look at the situation.

HONG KONG (JP): On April 17th, former President Chun Doo Hwan's life sentence for "mutiny, treason and corruption" was upheld, as was the 17 years imprisonment imposed upon former President Roh Tae Woo for the same offenses.

Earlier, Chun's initial death sentence had been reduced to life, and Roh's 22 and a half years imprisonment to seventeen years by the Seoul High Court, on the stated grounds of their contributions, while in office, to furthering South Korea's economic growth. The fact that Roh was also instrumental in aiding South Korea's transition to democracy evidently did not mitigate his punishment. The Supreme Court also sustained the hefty fines imposed upon Chun and Roh, equivalent to the size of the bribes they took while in office.

"The historic verdict wraps up our unhappy past history for a new start in our strides for democracy" the ruling New Korea Party (NKP) said in a statement. But this verdict seems premature. A "new start" could prove to be both difficult and elusive.

The "trial of the century" for the two former presidents, their humiliation at having to appear in public in prison garb, and their heavy sentencing as a result of the guilty verdict, are a cause for deep unhappiness in some conservative elite circles in South Korea. President Kim Young Sam first obtained office through alliance with these circles. Then, as the first civilian to be president in three decades, he was saying, in effect, that bygones should be bygones, and the verdict on past misdeeds should be left to the processes of history.

President Kim changed his mind as his own political standing weakened. He decided to give history a nudge. The statute of limitations was then waived, in order to bring the two presidents to trial long after their 1980 coup and its bloody aftermath.

Against this, there are many South Koreans, particularly in the southwestern Cholla provinces, who still bitterly remember the Kwangju Massacre in May 1980, when student demonstrators against the military takeover were shot by the military under Chun and Roh's overall command. For the residents of the Cholla capital, Kwangju, the two presidents now have been finally given their just rewards.

So while there will be strong pressure for an amnesty for the two Presidents from within the ruling party, and also from the United Liberal Democrats (ULD) opposition party, there will also be popular pressure to retain the sentences as they stand. The ULD had set its face against bringing the two presidents to trial. "From the beginning, our party has maintained that it was wrong to legislate special laws to punish the former presidents retroactively" one ULD leader said.

The ULD feels popular pressure of a different kind. Many ULD members come from North Kyongsang province. A further complication is that, with a presidential election due at the end of 1997, there will be unhappiness at Chun's and Roh's continued imprisonment in their former power base of the heavily populated North Kyongsang province, and the city of Taegu.

The political dilemma all these factors pose is particularly acute for Cholla's favorite son, veteran oppositionist and leader of the National Congress for New Politics (NCNP), Kim Dae Jung. After his defeat in the 1992 presidential election Kim Dae Jung announced his final retirement from politics. At that time those who knew him were skeptical that he would retire. Now Kim has announced that he will, after all, be running, yet again, for the presidency this year.

In order to win, he has to do what he has failed to do in his three previous unsuccessful bids -- win votes outside Cholla province, especially in either North or South Kyongsang provinces. Kim has to retain his Cholla base, but he must also appeal to the conservatives who have all along suspected his radicalism. Initially the NCNP has been silent about the Supreme Court's decisions. Kim Dae Jung must be hoping that his old nemesis Kim Young Sam will come to his aid by deciding on an amnesty before he has to take a position himself.

The sentences also place President Kim in a bind. The easiest thing for him to do would be to give Chun and Roh an amnesty just before he leaves office next February. But delaying action until then might well be an additional electoral handicap for the ruling NKP in this year's presidential election. The NKP has never been strong in Cholla but it cannot afford to lose in North Kyongsang by delaying an amnesty too long. Whoever is chosen as the NKP's candidate for president will have a difficult time striking a firm national posture on the issue.

Another complication for President Kim is that his attempt to set South Korea on a corruption-free road has backfired. Suspicion is now centered upon his son as a result of the collapse of the Hanbo steel-making conglomerate in highly questionable circumstances, strongly suggestive, to many South Koreans, that official corruption lingers on.

All told, President Kim may well be regretting that he did not leave judgment on his two predecessors to the history books. On the one hand, the trial of the two presidents has stirred up deep-seated Korean desires for righteousness -- desires which could focus upon him once he leaves office.

On the other hand, President Kim has left in place an economic system of government control over the economy, but particularly over South Korean banks and their decisions on which firms should get the big loans. Such control virtually makes large scale corruption inevitable, as firms, particularly the Korean conglomerates, the chaebols, seek to make sure that big loans come in their direction.

Meanwhile, the punishment of Chun and Roh will be certain to have impact elsewhere in Asia, in nations such as Myanmar and China, wherein those espousing democratic values have to struggle against entrenched authoritarian rulers.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that President Kim did positive harm to struggling democrats in East and Southeast Asia by waiving the rule of law in favor of a suspension of the statute of limitations, thereby demonstrating that vindictiveness towards past rulers could be one spinoff from democratic progress.

Vindictive righteousness seemed to be further illustrated on April 17th when it was additionally indicated that, in addition to the huge fines which the face, Chun and Roh would be losing their pay and benefits as ex-presidents, worth 10 million won per month, now that their guilt was confirmed.

Ostensibly, this loss, too, was according to the "rule of law". But the law governing their benefits was also changed when they were put on trial in December 1995.