As we have noted many times, in the run-up to the April 10, 2024, parliamentary elections, opposition leader Lee Jae-myung fought not only for the success of the Democratic Party of Korea, which he leads, but also for his personal freedom, as he is a defendant in several well-founded criminal cases. Lee emerged victorious, retaining the situation he occupied under the last parliament.
The Democrats and their allies won almost two thirds of the vote, but the infighting within the Democratic Party between Lee’s supporters and other factions is not over. The criminal cases against Lee have not been dropped either, and if a verdict is reached in just one of them then his political career will be in jeopardy. It will therefore be interesting to look at the prospects for the investigation into Lee and his associates, both as they appeared before the election and as they appear now.
Actions of the investigators in late 2023 and early 2024.
On November 30, 2023, Kim Yong, a close aide of Lee Jae-myung, was sentenced to five years in prison, ordered to pay a 70-million won fine and forfeit assets worth 670 million won. Kim, the former deputy head of the opposition Democratic Party’s main think tank, the Democracy Institute, was charged with receiving illegal political funds from a real estate developer in 2021 in connection with the Seongnamgate scandal, and taking 190 million won ($147,115) in bribes in 2013-14 from Yoo Dong-gyu, a former high-ranking official of the Seongnam Urban Development Corporation, in exchange for business services related to the project. Prosecutors have requested a 12-year prison sentence for Kim.
On Dec. 4, 2023, law enforcement officers conducted a search at the Gyeonggi provincial government office as part of an investigation into allegations that Lee Jae-myung’s wife illegally used a government credit card for personal purposes while Lee was governor of Gyeonggi Province from 2018-2021. Another defendant in the case, a former administration official known only by her surname, Bae, was sentenced to 10 months in prison, suspended for two years.
Closer to the election, however, the investigators’ zeal declined somewhat. This is natural – any attempt to put Lee in jail right before the election or otherwise increase pressure on him would generate opposition and would be more likely to bring additional votes to the Democrats.
Therefore, citing his duties as party leader, Lee attended court hearings only when it suited him, with the result that on March 19, the court issued a warning that it might consider issuing a subpoena requiring him to attend. In response, Lee’s side asked the court for permission to absent himself from hearings until the parliamentary elections, which were scheduled for April 10. The court denied the request, stating that court hearings should not be held when dealing with political issues, especially since some witnesses refused to testify in Lee’s absence. As a result, on April 9, the eve of the election, before entering the court, Lee Jae-myung actually held a pre-election meeting on an official non-campaigning day.
In addition, on March 12 Lee won in an important case. In........