Recently, South Korea underwent a political crisis since the current President Park Geun Hye, the first female president of South Korea was accused of corruption. Thousands of Koreans have come down on the streets to demand for the President’s impeachment. Eurasia conducted an exclusive interview with Dr. Rovshan Ibrahimov, Professor of Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul to gain more understandings of the current scandal.

Eurasia Diary: Can you please give us more insights into the President Scandal in South Korea?

Professor Ibrahimov: The reason of the scandal is because the President Park Geun Hye does not independently implement her executive responsibility, as the president of the state. She is accused of being under strong influence of her childhood friend Choi Soon-sil. This person Choi Soon-sil also recommend and advised the President in some important key political economic decision despite the fact that this woman is not involved officially in the government of South Korea. So Koreans just raise the question that how it is possible that we are dependent on the decisions of the President, who is manipulated by an ordinary citizen, who can affect domestic and foreign policy via the President of South Korea. That is why Koreans demand impeachment for President Park Geun Hye.

Eurasia Diary: So professor, is impeachment possible at all? Will South Korea get a new president soon?

Professor Ibrahimov: Actually, it is quite difficult to have impeachment because the Grand National Party has a lot of support from the Parliament despite the fact that they lost last election. And they are in a position now in Parliament. Therefore, there is a lot of support for the current president so impeachment is impossible. Another way is to demand the resignation of the President. And every weekend, as I am in Seoul, we are witnessing protests on the streets. On November 12 it was about 200,000 people coming together. Some of my students also participated. So the popularity of the President among the young generation like students sharply decreased.

Eurasia Diary: So how was the President viewed by the general public before the scandal? Was she popular?

Professor Ibrahimov: In general, the popularity of the President has never been good. Even when there was no such scandal, even before that the presidential popularity was very low. The people said that in fact President Park Geun Hye was elected not because of her special skills, but because of respect to her father, Park Chung Hee, who was assassinated in 1979, but had already ruled South Korea for a long time, and who was actually the founder of contemporary South Korea. He was the “architect” of the Korean current prosperous economic situation/ miracle. And before Saenuri party (the Grand National Party) gained quite sufficient support from the popularity, but during Park Geun Hye’s reign, this support seriously decreased due to her weak popularity and scandalous policies.

One more point is that there will be presidential election next year in December. And there is a serious question of who will be the Candidate for Saenuri Party, because popularity now seriously decreased. And President Park can only be elected one time due to South Korean constitution that there cannot be reelection of President. They can only be elected for one term. So with this scandal and so on, the new candidate of Saenuri will not be elected so probably a strong candidate for presidency will be leader of the democratic party – Moon, which is very active in the Parliament this year. So there is a very serious political problem in South Korea now.

Eurasia Diary: Will there be any impacts on the Korean economy as a result of this scandal?

Professor Ibrahimov: As for economy, the current President and her policies support big enterprises. Medium and small sized enterprises face serious problems. Nowadays people talk about Samsung scandal and economic problems in shipping, metallurgy sectors, which are also on the way of bankruptcy. The state is trying to support them financially and legally but nevertheless the President’s scandal is not related to the economic conditions. The key issue is that people are not satisfied with the acts of President with more concrete case of being manipulated by her friend.

Eurasia Diary: How do you assess the level of democracy in South Korea? Can the media enjoy their freedom of expression without being punished by the government? Are people free to raise their concerns?

Professor Ibrahimov: There is no serious problem in terms of democracy in Korea. The citizens reacted very strongly to the situation. The media also has wide options to spread information and ensure the democratic values of the society. But there are some structural problems in Korea. For example, it is related with constitutional foundation of Korea. It is related to the distributional power between executive branch and legislative branch. For example, despite the presidential party - Saenuri lost their position in, still government in South Korean is formed not by parliament but by president. So despite the party is minority in parliament, they still represent executive power. Government consists of representatives from presidential party. So this is of course a problem. South Korea needs to bring about a more workable system and structure of realization of governmental and state responsibility.

Eurasia Diary: Finally, what can you say about the South Korean Foreign policy?

Professor Ibrahimov: The main topic of South Korean foreign policy is North Korea. The government should try to provide necessary guarantee against possible threats from North Korea, especially with the escalation of tension starting from last year till now, with the implementation some policy in the field of realization of long-range ballistic missile, which is launched. So the relationship between North Korea and South Korea was sharply spoiled, everything comes to the minimum levels in all fields. This is not independent policy from South Korea. They try to pursue American interest in the region against North Korea and China. But in general, foreign policy of South Korea is more pro-neoliberal rather than based on geopolitics. As for economic relations South Korea tries to form mostly bilateral relations, with partner states and organizations. They want to promote increasing of export: Korean goods, and trade relations, even with their non-traditional regions for Korean exports like Latin America, Africa, and Post-Soviet republics. Korea also use Soft power: the attractiveness of Korean K-pop, dramas for promoting tourism, which in turn will promote trade and economic cooperation.

Eurasia Diary: Thank you very much for sharing!

Interview by Linh Tong