Give Kim a chance

After more than two decades of struggle and four tries, opposition leader Kim Dae-jung finally clinched a narrow victory in South Korea's presidential election Thursday.

Kim, 73, defeated rival candidate Lee Hoi-chang of the majority Grand National Party by 1.6 percentage points. Electoral returns showed 40.3 percent of the 30 million eligible voters were for Kim and 38.7 percent for Lee, while the remaining were for independent party leader Rhee In-je.

Kim's victory, however, comes at a time when the country is facing a series of economic debacles, leaving the president-elect no choice than to bow to and abide by agreements made by the outgoing South Korean administration with the International Monetary Fund, which has promised a US$60 billion rescue package to heal South Korea's economic ills.

This explains why Kim, during his victory acceptance speech yesterday, pledged that he "will cooperate with the IMF fully and completely" to try to bring South Korea out of its financial crisis.

Abiding by the IMF agreement would mean that South Korea would have to halve its economic growth rate to a mere 3 percent next year, according to many analysts. The IMF is insisting that South Korea curtail growth, raise taxes and interest rates and slow down the expansion of its powerful conglomerates. Analysts also believe that up to millions of people would lose their jobs as a result of restrained growth.

Kim pledged more help for the country's small businesses in contrast to outgoing President Kim Young-sam's administration which often directed banks to give conglomerates large credits in ways that proved to be covered by sleazy scandals, some of which even involved the president's own son.

Saying that small business is the engine of new economic development that needs to be nurtured, Kim stressed that "The next century will be the century of medium and small businesses".

Given all this, South Korea's choice of Kim Dae-jung as their leader to bring the country into the next millennium seems to be the most infallible one because he is willing to create a new environment for foreign investors and he is giving assurances that foreign investors would be treated the same as local investors in a fair and transparent way.

Besides, Kim's influence in South Korea's powerful labor unions is expected to placate workers who may lose their jobs as a result of the recession that is predicted to stay with the country for some time. As one Korean scholar has said of Kim: "In a sense, he does represent the voice of labor and the more radical elements of Korean society."

In the final analysis, only time will tell whether Kim's victory was simply a reflection of South Koreans' growing discontent with the scandal-ridden Grand National Party or a genuine belief that he is the man capable to lead the nation out of its current predicament. Although Kim won with a slim majority, the new opposition party would be well advised to throw their support behind the new president for a show of unity, and give him the opportunity to heal the country's economic ills.