Candidate Yoon Suk Yeol of the People Power Party (conservative party) was elected as the new President of the Republic of South Korea (ROK) defeating
He will legally earn the status of President-elect and take on office on May 5, the final day of the Moon Administration, for a five-year term.
Yoon Suk Yeol will become the 20th President of the country and the fifth conservative President since the restoration of democracy in South Korea.
A very tight victory
Following the data published by the National Election Commission (NEC), Yoon won the elections with 16,394,815 votes, or 48.56%, in the March 9 presidential election. Runner-up Lee Jaemyung of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea received 16,147,738 votes, or 47.83%.
Voter turnout in the presidential election was 77.1%, or a tenth of a percentage point lower than in 2017. Of 44,197,692 eligible voters in this election, 33,454,249 voted at 14,464 polling stations nationwide, NEC .
Probably good news for the USA and not so good for China, Tongfi Kim advances
Tongfi Kim (Programme Director of the BA in International Affairs and Professor at the Centre for Security, Diplomacy and Strategy -CSDS- of the Brussels School of Governance -BSoG-VUB-) shared his oppinions on the orientation that Yoon’s Government probably will mark on ROK’s international relations as soon as the new President takes office next May.
“Reflecting the opinions of his support base, Yoon has been criticizing the conciliatory approach of the Moon government towards North Korea, instead advocating a policy that emphasises deterrence and ‘peace through strength’,” he points.
“Yoon and his advisors therefore have been arguing for the reinforcement of US extended deterrence against North Korea through joint military exercises, updating of military operational plans, and increased deployment of US military assets, including additional deployment of the anti-ballistic missile system, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD).” And China sees THAAD as a threat to its own security, he underscores.
Besides, “President-elect Yoon has emphasized the strategic importance of Tokyo to Seoul and will push for strengthening the trilateral security coordination,” Tongfi Kim adds. Thats another thing that probably Us. President Biden’s Administration will be happy with.
“Yoon’s foreign policy team is reportedly interested in South Korea’s membership in an expanded Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (the so-called Quad) between India, the United States, Japan, and Australia, a forum which Beijing sees as an attempt at geopolitically encircling China,” this exprert adds.
Despite Yoon’s pro US inclination, Tongfi Kim points that this does not mean “…that its interests will always align with those of the United States.South Korea under Yoon will continue to value the country’s economic ties with China, hoping to separate its geopolitical alignment from economic activities. If US policy becomes more conciliatory towards North Korea, the Yoon government can also become a critical voice against it”
This expert from the Brussels School of Governance explains that surrely South Korean domestic politics will affect the Yoon government’s policy towards the United States too as Liberals still have the majority in the National Assembly, at least until 2024 and the “public opinion will constrain what the pro-US president can do”.
I fully recomend Eastwind followers reading the several articles on Yoon’s election by Tongfi Kim, Maximilian Ernst and Ramon Pacheco Pardo all of them experts from the Korea Chair at the Brussels School of Governance. I provide a link to the main article titled ” The Foreign Policy of President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol: What to Expect “at the end of this post.
A newcomer in politics, known by his fight against corruption through power abuse
Former Prosecutor General of the republic of South Korea, Yoon Suk Yeol resigned in March last year, and officially announced his bid for the presidency in June 2021.
This admiror of British Prime Minister Winston Churchill joined the main opposition People Power Party a month later earning the party’s nomination four months after.
A meteorically fast political career that has led him to be elected as the 20th President of ROK just today.
Born in 1960 in Seoul, Yoon is the eldest son of two professors. He got graduated by the Choongam High School in Seoul and majored in law at Seoul National University. He passed the law bar in 1991 at his 31’s on the ninth attempt.
Yoon Suk Yeol began his career at the Daegu Public Prosecutor’s Office three years later and built his good reputation along 27 years specially thanks to his special investigations into corruption crimes committed through abuse of power.
Yoon is Korea’s first prosecutor to be elected as the President of ROK.
He was baptized with the Catholic name Ambrosio at college but is also well-versed in Buddhism and Protestantism. In his free time he likes going on walking with his dogs, visiting art museums and cooking. Yoon likes baseball and is a fan of the Korea Baseball Organization pro team Doosan Bears. He likes kimchi and prefers noodles better than rice.
Yoon married Kim Kun-hee, an exhibition planner 12 years younger than him, in March 2012 when he was 52 years old. They have no children, but they have a big famuly comprised by four dogs (Tori, Narae, Marie and Sunny) and three cats (Aggaengi, Nabi and Norangi), “who” live with both at their home at Seocho-dong neighborhood of Seoul’s Seocho-gu District.
Image over the headline.- Yoon Suk Yeol (President elect of the Republic of Korea). Image by 대한민국 대법원 through Wikimedia Commons. To watch the original photo and read the terms of the lisense, click here.
Related external links:
“The Foreign Policy of President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol: What to Expect”
Related Eastwind links (President Moon Jae-in’s promise on solving the divide with the DPRK):
North Korea, considering to resume test launches of nuclear missiles
Winter Youth Olympic Games, going to Korea in 2024
South and North Korea leaders meet to talk on advancing Panmunjeom and Kim Jong Un summit with Trump
South and North Korea, to hold peace summit next April
Norht Korea agrees on closing nuclear test site next May
Both Koreas, under one joint Olympic flag while regional disputes still pending
Other Eastwind links on ROK:
Spanish restaurants, tapas and food products, increasingly popular in Korea
