Roh Moo-Hyun, 1946-2009   2009-05-24 08:10

Yesterday morning, the entire country was shocked by the news of the former President's suicide. Roh Moo-Hyun, 62, had been South Korea's leader until just about a year ago.

According to the police, Roh went hiking at dawn, arriving at a 100-foot cliff known as Owl Rock with nobody but one security guard beside him. There he chatted with the guard for a few minutes before unexpectedly throwing himself off the cliff. The guard did not have any time to react. Roh, who suffered major injuries to his head, was immediately carried to a nearby hospital but died soon afterwards. A note was found on his computer, which was apparently meant to be a will of some kind.

Roh Moo-Hyun, 1946-2009, President of the Republic of Korea, 2003-2008

Despite his high-profile career in the last couple of decades, Roh's early life was poverty-stricken. He finished high school only with the help of a scholarship, a rare blessing at the time. He could not afford to go to college, so he studied law on his own while making a living as a manual laboror. This humble experience prompted Roh to pursue very progressive policies, which his critics argued (as usual) that his liberal pursuits hurted the economy. Despite such allegations, the South Korean economy hit the $20,000 per capita GDP mark for the first time during Roh's term -- though, admittedly, this did little to improve the everyday living conditions of the working class.

A former judge and then a lawyer who gained fame through his passionate defense of human rights, Roh's tenure saw an unprecedented growth of our democratic rights and liberties. Roh was elected to the legislature for the first time in 1988; in the same year, he became the star of a major political-corruption hearing by grilling everyone with incisive questions. When former President Chun Doo-Hwan stubbornly refused to admit responsibility for Gwangju massacre and other atrocities, Roh threw his nameplate at Chun, calling him "a murderous devil".

Roh didn't have much luck in a few other elections since then, but made a comeback in a 1998 by-election. Interestingly, the seat he snatched up used to belong to Lee Myung-Bak (the current President whom we all know and hate). At the time, Lee was accused of grossly misreporting his election funds (he'd reported only 10% of it), and had decided to resign before he faced the "dishonor" of losing his seat in the legislature (as if he cared about honor).

The rivalry between Roh and Lee, as we can see, goes way back. Not only did Lee lose his legislative seat to Roh, but one of the men whom Roh grilled at the aforementioned hearing was none other than Chung Ju-Yung, Lee's direct superior during his illustrious business career. No wonder Lee has been hellbent on reversing every single policy ever enacted by Roh! Both our economic growth and our human rights are now little more than phantoms of the past; and now, the man who made it possible is also gone, a victim of fierce political wars.

Owl Rock, from which Roh leapt: a view from his hometown of Bongha.

In December 2002, Roh was elected President on a platform of national pride, promising friendly relationships with North Korea and less dependence on the United States. This platform, along with the hope that his humble origins gave to many who wished for change, made Roh immensely popular among the "386 generation" (those under 40) and especially on the Internet. But the flip side of Roh's peculiar career was that he had pretty much zero connections with big business and the conservative media. Roh struggled hard, trying to overcome his relative inexperience on the one hand, and on the other hand trying to secure cooperation from those around him. It took quite a bit of trial and error for Roh to establish his position as the Head of State. Many of his proposed reforms were met with insurmountable resistance from within the government itself.

And of course, there were plenty of people who wanted to take advantage of the new face in the Blue House. Scandals raged all around him, though Roh himself was never directly implicated. But then, Roh wasn't particularly careful in his choice of political maneuvers. He spoke too plainly, without any of those vague and sugary flatteries one would normally expect of a high-profile politician. He didn't go about spraying money, and he refused to respect those comfy customs that acted as a seedbed of corruption. In short, Roh just didn't seem prepared for the dirty alleys of Seoul politics. Every misplaced speech of his was instantly picked up by mainstream media such as Chosun Ilbo to demonstrate the alleged damages wreaked by a socialist (or whatever else they called him). In March 2004, the opposition impeached Roh -- the only President so far to suffer the humiliation. The impeachment was later reversed by the Constitutional Court, but Roh's hands and feet were now as good as locked down.

Although millions of people rallied in support of him during the impeachment affair, Roh's popularity kept sliding. The slide was fed both by the mainstream media's "incompetent socialist" rhetoric and the betrayal of Roh's own associates who wanted more power for themselves than Roh was willing to grant them. By the end of his troubled Presidency, even the political party of Roh's own creation -- Uri Party, which had changed its name to the more generic Democratic Party -- openly advocated hostility towards Roh. In the December 2007 Presidential election, Democratic candidate Chung Dong-Young, who ran on an anti-Roh platform, lost big time to neo-conservative Lee Myung-Bak. The Democratic Party also lost the April 2008 general election, leaving it with little power to hold Lee's runaway dictatorship in check. Everything that Roh had tried to establish during his Presidency began to fall apart like a house of cards. Disappointed, Roh returned to his hometown of Bongha, saying he would spend the rest of his life as a farmer.

He may have had good intentions when he started, but he was too naive.

Roh is probably the only President so far to have enjoyed warmer feelings towards him after his departure from the Blue House than during his tenure. This, is course, was because his successor and longtime rival, Lee Myung-Bak, has been royally screwing up the whole country since last year. Many people who used to be critical of Roh's persona and politics -- myself included -- have come to realize that, despite his obvious shortcomings, Roh was a much better President overall than Lee can ever be. People may not agree with Roh's political values, but at least he didn't trample on people's Constitutional rights in trying to get things done!

Seeing as how the current administration's critics flocked to the rural village of Bongha in search of solace, Lee's cronies must have thought that they had to take out Roh in order to squelch the never-ending protests. Of course, they don't seem to have intended Roh's death; in politics, scandals often work much better than guns. Assassinate your enemy, and he becomes known as a martyr. Drag him into a dirty scandal, and you can make him an object of ridicule.

As early as July 2008, the government tried to hold Roh responsible for taking an electronic copy of his Presidential records with him. (A brief summary is available in my earlier post.) Roh argued that it was his right as a former President to be able to access those documents, and that the copies he kept were a temporary measure until secure real-time connections to the central repository were established. (Yes, it's all digital here in South Korea. Roh himself designed the Presidential record-keeping system!) But then, strictly speaking, making a hard copy instead of remote access was a violation of some stone-age security protocol. A scandal ensued, and Roh's supporters reproached Lee's government for picking on minor issues for the purpose of political vengeance.

As the government started to harass Roh's friends and aides over the issue, Roh gave up his defense and unconditionally returned all of his hard drives to the central repository. It was at this time that Roh's supporters and agnostics alike realized there was something special with this man: he preferred to let the blame fall on himself than to let his associates suffer for his mistakes. That was a feature which usually didn't belong to high-profile politicians; everyone blames everyone else in this game. Even Roh, while in office, did that on more than one occasion. But the ex-President seemed different. Is that something that becomes possible when one has been to the top, has seen enough of it, and has no further ambitions? I don't know, but Roh's display of karma in handling the "hard-drive affair" sure attracted even more supporters.

But this year, the government returned with a vengeance. Now they had a much more compelling scandal to wage against Roh: a businessman had given $6 million to several of Roh's relatives, mostly towards the end of Roh's Presidency. As the investigation slowly proceeded, the government argued that the "bribe" was intended for Roh; while Roh's representatives maintained that the transactions in question were part gifts, part loans, and part business investments, and that Roh himself had nothing to do with them. (By the way, why would someone bribe a retiring politician whose party has lost every major election in the last couple of years? What influence has he?)

The "investigation" quickly turned into a political battle, totally independent of the merits of the case itself. The public prosecutors who took up the case ignored all protocols in trying to get every little suspicion published as soon as possible; pro-government newspapers such as Chosun Ilbo picked up those wild guesses, packaged them as fact, and argued that this was the proof of Roh's moral bankruptcy. Roh's supporters yelled back that the whole "scandal" was fabricated to deal a heavy blow to Lee's enemies, but the sheer volume of "believe it or not" journalism was impossible to counter by any ordinary means. Irrelevant details were publicized and exploited, such as how Roh's daughter got the money to buy a $1 million condo in New Jersey. (Heck, she's married to an American lawyer, that's how! Besides, has anybody heard of mortgages?) People were getting arrested all around Roh: his brother, his former secretary, his niece's husband, etc. All the while anti-government protests rocked the nation every single day.

And then, apparently, Roh decided to put an end to it all.

Roh's funeral procession, May 23.

Roh left the following note, according to the secretary who found it on his computer:

I am indebted to too many people.

I have caused many to suffer too much pain.

I cannot imagine how much more pain will have to follow.

My life has become nothing but a burden.

My health has deteriorated to the point that I can't do anything.

I can't even read or write.

Don't be too sad.

Both life and death are parts of nature.

Do not be sorry. Do not blame anyone. It's destiny.

Cremate. Leave nothing but a very small gravestone.

I've thought about this for a long time.

The following is also attributed to Roh, though media reports disagree on this:

Life has become too hard, like a prison.

I served my country with passion, the best I could;

but they keep criticizing me. It was agonizing.

They make me look like an incompetent statesman

who went corrupt and extorted money from my associates.

My family, my friends, my acquaintances are living lonely in prison.

I am lonely too. I am suffocating.

My son, my daughter, and my supporters: I am so sorry.

I just wanted to retire to the country, but it didn't work as I intended.

They attack me about money; but in this regard I am clean.

I took pride in being clean.

Let history be my judge.

I don't think we will learn, anytime soon, the truth surrounding Roh's fatal scandal. History tends to erase truths about people who lost the power game. We will not know, with any certainty, what really prompted Roh to climb the hill despite his ill health and then to fling himself over the cliff. Don't believe the English-language media which make it sound as if Roh killed himself to avoid certain prosecution. No proof of his involvement in his relatives' bribery scandal has been found so far; the entire investigation, as I said, has been more of a publicity stunt.

Questions, question, more questions. Probably unanswerable.

Was he guilty and couldn't stand the humiliation of being found so?

Was he innocent and couldn't stand the thought of being butchered alive by Seoul's political vengeance? ("I'll save you the trouble of having to tell more lies about me.")

Was he guilty and wanted to take all the blame, so that his children and friends would be safe?

Was he innocent and just couldn't stand the sight of his family's suffering? ("Let my son and daughter go; you can kill me instead.")

Did he blame himself for not having been able to stop this from happening?

Did he think that he could stop the onslaught of political vengeance by permanently removing himself from the battlefield, leaving his rivals with an empty target?

Did he expect a democratic uprising at the news of his death?

Did he intend to kill himself at all?

As in any high-profile death, conspiracy theories are already abound. Some suspect that Roh was murdered. (Only one person saw him jump from the cliff.) Some suspect that his testament was tainted. (After all, it is so easy to edit a computer file. Yes, we know that Roh was one of the most tech-savvy politicians in this country; but why didn't he leave a handwritten note?) Political activists are now discussing what effects Roh's death would have upon the recent series of anti-government protests. C'mon, can't you just let the deceased rest in peace for one day?

Meanwhile, Roh's legacy lives on. The discussion website Democracy 2.0, which he created in September 2008, has established itself as one of South Korea's major venues for the online discussion of weighty political issues. Bongha village, where he lived and died, has become one of the most famous rural towns in the country; human rights activists and other critics of Lee's oppressive measures gravitate towards it as if on a pilgrimage. Roh's policy on North Korea will remain a controversial issue for years to come. And most of all, people will keep contrasting Roh's human rights record with that of his shameful successor.

What good is a "competent" leader if he has not the slightest regard for the Constitutional principles by which he is supposed to have vowed to stand?

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