South Korea’s Park: From political princess to courtroom accused
seoul — The corridors of power were home to South Korea’s Park Geun-hye as a child, de facto first lady, and president. Now she resides at a detention centre, and is addressed as “the accused”.
Park went on trial on Tuesday over the corruption scandal that made her the country’s first head of state to be removed by impeachment.
Now 65, Park grew up in the spotlight at the Blue House presidential complex, enjoying a pampered life as the eldest child of military dictator Park Chung-Hee.
Despite rights abuses, he oversaw rapid economic development during his 1961-1979 rule, with the first family treated as royalty by some supporters and Park dubbed the young “princess”. The assassinations
I’m married to the Republic of Korea. I have no children. south Koreans are my family. Park Geun-hye
of both her parents five years apart in the 1970s only further fanned sympathy for her.
Park’s mother was murdered by a Korean-Japanese believed to have been acting on Pyongyang’s orders. A student in France at the time, Park returned home to assume the role of first lady until her father was killed by his own security chief in 1979.
She subsequently kept a low profile for nearly two decades, until she made a successful 1998 bid to become a lawmaker as the South reeled from the fallout of the Asian financial crisis. Park rose quickly up the political ladder, earning the nickname “the queen of elections” due to her voters’ unwavering loyalty.
The fact that she never married and was estranged from her two siblings was part of her appeal, in a country where leaders had often been embroiled in major corruption scandals involving relatives.
“I’m married to the Republic of Korea. I have no children. South Koreans are my family,” Park once said, citing her role model as Elizabeth I of England — known as the ‘Virgin Queen’. Eventually Park was elected the South’s first female president in 2012, winning the highest vote share of any candidate in the democratic era.
But it was the family of a shady religious figure she chose as a mentor who ultimately sowed the seeds of her downfall.
Her relationship with Choi TaeMin, began in the 1970s when he sent her letters claiming that he had seen her dead mother in his dreams.
His influence grew until a US diplomatic cable published by Wikileaks noted widespread rumours that he had “complete control over Park’s body and soul”.
He died in 1994, and his daughter Choi Soon-Sil — already a friend who handled Park’s daily life including her wardrobe choices — inherited his role. —