Presidential hopefuls disclose assets: Ahn richest at W137b, Lee at W3b
Rep. Lee Jae-myung, leader of the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea and a leading presidential contender if an early election is called, reported over 3 billion won ($2 million) in personal assets, government data showed Thursday.
According to annual asset disclosures released separately by the National Assembly's Ethics Committee and the Government Public Ethics Committee, Lee's total assets amounted to 3.08 billion won as of the end of 2023, down 26 million won from the previous year.
Lee jointly owns an apartment in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, with his wife Kim Hye-kyung. The apartment was valued at 1.45 billion won — up 4.97 percent from a year earlier.
He also reported purchasing a 2024 Genesis G80 sedan. His financial assets include 1.584 billion won in bank savings and 138 million won in liabilities.
Among other presidential hopefuls from the Democratic Party, Gyeonggi Province Gov. Kim Dong-yeon — considered a key figure in the party's anti-Lee faction — reported assets worth 3.5 billion won, up 168 million won from the previous year.
From the ruling bloc, Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon topped the list of sitting metropolitan mayors with 7.4 billion won in declared assets, marking an increase of 1.43 billion won on-year — the largest both in total assets and asset growth among regional government heads. The rise was attributed to gains in the value of US stocks, including Nvidia and MicroStrategy, despite a decline in his bank deposits, according to local reports.
Daegu Mayor Hong Joon-pyo ranked third among metropolitan mayors with 4.26 billion won in assets. Labor Minister Kim Moon-soo reported 1.07 billion won, about 30 million won more than what he declared during his confirmation hearing in November last year.
Rep. Ahn Cheol-soo of the ruling People Power Party was the wealthiest among all presidential hopefuls, with 136.8 billion won in declared assets. His portfolio includes 1.86 million shares of AhnLab, a cybersecurity company he founded prior to entering politics, valued at 123.1 billion won.
Rep. Lee Jun-seok, leader of the minor conservative Reform Party and the first to officially declare his presidential bid, reported 1.47 billion won in assets.
Former Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum and former South Gyeongsang Gov. Kim Kyung-soo — both considered potential opposition candidates — as well as former People Power Party leader Han Dong-hoon and former lawmaker Yoo Seong-min — key figures within the conservative bloc — were not subject to this round of asset disclosures as they neither hold public office nor serve in parliament.
According to a public opinion poll on support ratings for presidential hopefuls released Thursday by pollster Research View, Lee Jae-myung led the race with 48.3 percent support, followed by Kim Moon-soo (16.4 percent), Hong Joon-pyo (6.5 percent), Han Dong-hoon (5.7 percent), Oh Se-hoon (4.9 percent), and Kim Dong-yeon (3.1 percent).
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Korea Herald
an hour ago
- Korea Herald
[Wang Son-taek] Keys to success for the Lee administration
President Lee Jae-myung, who took office on June 4, has been busy. He is working to resolve the six-month national crisis that left the country without a president because of the martial law declaration by former President Yoon Suk Yeol. It is also urgent for Lee to appoint high-ranking officials to help him run the government over the next five years. Though he is very busy right now, he might hope to see his administration succeed -- in other words, to reestablish governance. Since the democratization of the Republic of Korea in 1987, there have only been two successful cases where the government has been wholly rebuilt -- specifically, the elections in 1992 and 2002. However, it is necessary to put aside the 1992 election of President Kim Young-sam, given that it resulted from a political trick -- the merger of three major parties. On the other hand, the election of President Roh Moo-hyun in 2002 can be evaluated entirely as the result of public judgment. His election as president was mainly due to the public's relatively positive evaluation of his predecessor, President Kim Dae Jung. The other presidents were all subject to public criticism but failed to lay the groundwork for a successful transfer of power to the opposition. The newly launched Lee Jae-myung administration should closely examine the background of the Kim Dae-jung administration's success and the causes of other governments' failures. Three variables might be derived by analyzing the successes and failures. The first is the zeitgeist, or the spirit of the times; the second is communication and the third is unity. President Kim Dae-jung always tried to grasp the zeitgeist, and once it had been understood, he demonstrated his utmost efforts to bring it to fruition. Until the 1990s, he focused on the struggle for democratization and political development. In the 2000s, he raised national topics such as national unity, informatization and technology, inter-Korean reconciliation and cooperation. What might be the zeitgeist President Lee is facing? The first priority is overcoming insurrection. Efforts should be made to heal the psychological wounds of the people, shocked by the insurrection, by establishing institutional arrangements to prevent it from occurring again. The second most important task is to proceed with national reconstruction, which Korea must elevate to the next level by reforming and improving policies the state completely reversed during the three years of the Yoon Suk Yeol government. To this end, we propose a new Korean-style national development model and a national reconstruction campaign. To upgrade our democracy, it is necessary to introduce additional systems that guarantee popular sovereignty and to march with the people toward a future in which national integration can take place naturally. In terms of the economy, we need a national campaign to become a creativity-oriented society in which diversity, inclusiveness and tolerance are respected and where people can try again after failure. It is true that governments other than the Kim Dae-jung administration acknowledged the spirit of the times. The problem is that their actions went in different or opposite directions. The second task in succeeding as a government is effective communication. President Kim Dae-jung's communication method was surprisingly simple. First, to understand what policies the people wanted, he referred to opinions expressed in newspapers and broadcasts as much as possible. The next step was to candidly explain to the public the background of his policies and seek support. Even if a policy did not get 100 percent support, a candid explanation helped lessen the degree of rejection by the people. While pursuing his policies as the next step, Kim admitted to errors when things went wrong and sought understanding by explaining what happened. Listening to public opinion, explaining policies in advance and elucidating policy failures were key elements of Kim Dae-jung's successful communication. Although these elements seem simple, they are not easy to implement. If officials in charge of state affairs neglect the people and focus only on the struggle for power, they will not achieve public acceptance because frank communication would mean political defeat. Ironically, this is a key factor that led to the success of the Kim Dae-jung administration and the failure of other governments. The last of the three successful elements of the Kim Dae-jung government is that it made every effort to unify the people. National unity is also easy to talk about but challenging to achieve. This is because "the people" are ultimately the voters who support a leader in today's situation of severe political polarization. In a sense, voters who do not support the winner of an election might not count as citizens. Kim never discriminated against the people who did not support him, which was one of the great secrets to his success. For President Lee Jae-myung, achieving national unity will be more difficult than it was for President Kim because political polarization has become so extreme. Nevertheless, if President Lee repeatedly reaches out to and embraces the conservatives who oppose, fear and despise him, antipathy toward him will undoubtedly lessen. Then, the energy he would have spent attacking the opposition can be put into developing the policies that the majority of people want. In that scenario, there would be no reason for him not to succeed. The Lee Jae-myung administration has a much greater chance of success than its predecessors. This is because most of the negative images of President Lee are simply illusions. Within the next three months or so, it is certain that the baseless slanders against him will disappear. However, improving Lee Jae-myung's image does not guarantee success. The administration must work hard to grasp the zeitgeist, communicate strategically and achieve national unity as the great Kim Dae-jung did. These may well be sufficient conditions for success.
Korea Herald
an hour ago
- Korea Herald
[Editorial] No retaliation in probes
Special counsels should be neutral figures to avoid suspicions of revenge, oppression Three bills mandating special counsel probes into allegations involving the administration of former President Yoon Suk Yeol were enacted Tuesday following approval at a Cabinet meeting. One of the bills requires special counsels to investigate insurrection and treason charges related to Yoon's failed declaration of martial law. The second bill calls for a probe into allegations against Yoon's wife, Kim Keon Hee. She allegedly accepted luxury goods as bribes, manipulated stock prices and intervened illegally in the People Power Party's nomination of candidates for the National Assembly. The third bill deals with the death of a Marine who drowned while searching for missing flood victims and the presidential office's alleged pressure on officials investigating his death. The bills mark the first legislation for President Lee Jae-myung since taking office last week. Their passage through the Assembly was led by the ruling Democratic Party of Korea. Simultaneous special counsels investigating three cases against key figures from the previous administration and possibly lawmakers from the People Power Party are unprecedented. In light of the seriousness of the allegations, the truth needs to be uncovered. But the investigations should be impartial and transparent. If not, they are likely to be caught up in suspicions of political retaliation. Investigations of the allegations in question are either completed or ongoing. They were conducted separately by the prosecution, the police and the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials. The government and the ruling party say the legislation was intended to increase the efficiency of the investigations by integrating the separate probes and revealing the overall truth in all three cases, but there is concern about the scale of the investigation and how special counsels are appointed. As many as 120 prosecutors will be assigned to three special counsel teams. This figure is more than half of the number of prosecutors at the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office, the nation's largest. Hundreds of investigation officers and assistants will also join. Allocating so many resources to the special counsel probes could set back investigations into other cases affecting the lives of ordinary people. Among other provisions, the bills give only the Democratic Party and the minor opposition Rebuilding Korea Party, which almost always stands by the now-ruling party, the exclusive right to recommend special counsels in the three cases. It is hard to dispel worries about the political neutrality of their investigations. The appointment of special counsels is a supplementary system designed to keep those in power from pushing biased investigations. It should be used in exceptional circumstances and only as necessary. But the Democratic Party unilaterally passed bills that expand the scope of special counsel probes and grant nominating authority exclusively to certain parties. It is true that suspicions about the previous administration still need to be addressed, and some investigations have been criticized as insufficient. But in a situation where Lee and the Democratic Party are now in power, it is questionable whether special counsels are even necessary to investigate the previous administration instead of using the existing judicial system. It is difficult to erase suspicions of political motivations. The opposition People Power Party has condemned the bills, arguing that the special counsels' "triple investigations" are political revenge. If the investigations were used as a lever of power for political suppression, as the People Power Party worries, it would be a grave threat to democracy. The special counsel investigations should not split the nation into "us versus them," either. People experienced deep division during the Moon Jae-in administration due to its drive to eliminate "the evils of the past," which led to claims of a political vendetta. Lee vowed to base his government on "integration." If so, the special counsel probes should serve as a just means of revealing the truth and ultimately restoring the rule of law, not a means for retaliation and oppression. That begins with appointing special counsels who are politically unbiased and widely respected.
Korea Herald
11 hours ago
- Korea Herald
Lee silences border loudspeakers
Decision aimed at easing tension with Pyongyang: presidential office South Korea on Wednesday suspended its loudspeaker broadcasts aimed at North Korea, as part of the liberal Lee Jae-myung administration's efforts to ease tension with Pyongyang. According to the presidential office, President Lee ordered the broadcasts, via loudspeakers installed in border area, to be halted starting 2 p.m. Wednesday. 'This decision reflects President Lee's commitment to restoring trust with North Korea and advancing his peace policy for the Korean Peninsula,' Lee's spokesperson Kang Yu-jung said during a press briefing held Wednesday afternoon in Yongsan, Seoul. Kang further described the suspension as a 'step to ease the burden on residents in border areas who have long suffered from noise broadcasts targeting the North.' She added that the decision was made as a gesture of goodwill, particularly in light of the absence of any major provocations from North Korea in recent weeks. President Lee had pledged during his campaign ahead of the June 3 presidential election to halt the operation as part of broader efforts to ease inter-Korean tensions and rebuild trust. According to an official from the presidential office, the decision was made during a Cabinet meeting held the previous day. It came exactly a week after the Lee administration took office on June 4. The broadcasts had been resumed by the conservative Yoon Suk Yeol administration in June 2024 after a six-year hiatus. The decision came as North Korea continued sending waste-filled balloons across the border, prompting Seoul to suspend the 2018 inter-Korean military agreement.
