South Korea is one of the four Asian Tigers in Far East Asia and is currently headed by Park Geun-hye, the first female president of the nation. Neither is she a Muslim nor was she born in the land of the pure but she has a reputation for strict adherence to the promises she makes with people. She holds a bachelors degree in engineering and has been showered with honorary doctoral degrees. She won the presidential elections of December 2012 and assumed her responsibilities as the 18th president of South Korea on February 25, 2013. Her success in the presidential elections may be considered a grateful nation’s thanks to her father Park Chung-hee, who had presided over South Korea for 16 years and had led the nation to become one of the developed nations of the world, with an economy of $ 1.76 trillion.
When Park took over, South Korea was one of the poorest nations. Its per capita income was just $ 72 a year, lower than most Latin American and some sub-Saharan countries. The economy was in tatters and heavily dependent on international alms and foreign aid. Under the focused and determined leadership of Park, South Korea’s leap from the destruction rendered by the Korean War to become one of the largest economies was indeed a miracle and rightly known as the “miracle on the Han River”, named after the river that flows through the capital.
Park played a vital role in transforming the entire nation. One of his first steps was to launch an effective crackdown against corruption. Leading but corrupt businessmen were arrested and corrupt businesses were fined. He shifted focus onto export oriented industrialisation. Government-corporate cooperation helped to expand South Korean exports and grow some companies into the financial conglomerates of today. Samsung Electronics, Hyundai Motor, LG and Hyundai-Kia are a few examples. Under Park’s thumb, the nation witnessed inclusive development and growth. All economic indicators were moving upwards. The government did not put all these resources into distributing laptops and operating metro buses. Rather, it focused on rapid industrialisation and technological advancement. The education boom was accompanied by continuously rising living standards and modernisation. A poor nation was on its way to becoming one of the world’s richest nations within the next five decades!
Hailing from a military background, Park indeed was not a prophet of democratic values. He believed that a poor nation could not enjoy the luxury of democracy if it were destined to be a developed society. To him, democracy was a vice that obstructed the way towards inclusive economic growth. He believed that poor citizens, who work hard just to make ends meet, cannot play any meaningful role towards the development of a nation. Therefore, in his view, eradication of poverty was the very first step for the nation’s march on the democratic path. Today, some remember him as a ruthless and repressive dictator. Others call him a strict gentleman. Many people may agree with Park’s doctrine and a lot more may feel happier to disagree but no one can deny the fact that South Korea has emerged as one of the richest nations in the world, where democracy is never afraid of an invisible script writer.
Park was the product of continuous political turmoil. He was a major general in the South Korean army when a student-led uprising started sloganeering, “Go, Syngman-Rhee go”. Syngman-Rhee was the president of South Korea at that time. He was kicked out of office on April 25, 1960. This was followed by a period of political and social unrest. Devastated by the Korean War and a decade of ruthless corruption, angry protesters were on the roads demanding political and economic reforms. The police, discredited and demoralised, deleted maintaining law and order from its job description. Politicians kept busy giving lectures on the benefits of democracy that were of no one’s interest. For an ordinary citizen, the tunnel was dark and its end was darker. Hopelessness ruled the length of the country. This was when Park said “enough”, decided to march on, shut the theatre down and start his own show. The Military Revolutionary Committee led a coup on May 19, 1961. In 1963, he was elected as president of South Korea and he ruled with an iron hand until his assassination in 1979. Had the military not decided to move ahead and lead the nation, to what extent would South Korea have been different today from North Korea? The answer explains well the role of leadership in the transformation of any nation, business or institution.
It seems that Park followed in the footsteps of General Ayub Khan, who led a coup in 1958. The first five-year plans of South Korea, starting from 1962, seem to take inspiration from Pakistan’s second five-year plans from 1960 to 1965 that gave highest priority to industrial development and encouraged participation of the private sector. Our irony is that, though we live in the land of pure, we have had neither pure dictatorship nor democracy. Our dictators longed to be democratic and our politicians wish to be the ones whose utterances should immediately be considered as law. Perhaps we are blindfolded and cursed to travel in a circle forever. Otherwise, how come, in 2014, we are at the same place where we were in 1958 or where South Korea stood in 1961?
Today, half of the population is counting the days of its life under the poverty line and more are on the way to join their ranks. Corruption has become the national identity and politicians worship it like a goddess. The police take pride in serving as the personal force of the rulers. The nation is witnessing a great political crisis but the rulers are unable to fathom its magnitude. Thousands of protesters are practically living in front of parliament and honourable parliamentarians contemptuously call them “gypsies” and “enemies” of democracy. At the expense of the taxpayers’ money, a joint session of parliament is over and its collected wisdom badly failed to show a way out of the current political impasse.
No matter if one approves or disapproves of the politics of sit-ins, the majority of the population is not content with the performance of consecutive democratic governments. People need change and visible improvement in governance. We have witnessed the failure of democratic and military governments in helping the nation advance and progress. Perhaps, at this moment, all stakeholders should sit together, define the national agenda and ensure its successful execution. It is evident that some tough decisions are to be made. If our political leadership still prefers not minding its business, someone else will. Or we will risk standing on the same ground in 2050 where we stand today.
The writer is a freelance columnist. He can be contacted at [email protected]