Conservative wins S. Korea presidency
Landslide margin marks a clear shift; Aims to focus on economy
SEOUL - Lee Myung-bak, a can-do former construction boss nicknamed "the bulldozer," won a landslide victory yesterday in the South Korean presidential election.
Lee's margin of victory, the largest since democratic presidential elections began here 20 years ago, decisively ended a decade of rule by Presidents Kim Dae-jung and his successor Roh Moo-hyun, former dissidents who had focused on reconciliation with North Korea.
The Communist North, which has agreed in recent months to disable its nuclear facilities, was barely an issue in this presidential campaign. Similarly, allegations of corruption against Lee, which surfaced noisily over the weekend, left voters unmoved.
"No one is absolutely clean when you strip-search successful and wealthy businessmen in Korea," said Ahn Jae-woo, 54, an insurance executive who voted for Lee early this morning before going Christmas shopping with his family in a Seoul mall. "This election is not about ethical issues; it's about who is really capable of making Korea prosperous."
South Korea's export-driven economy has drifted a bit in recent years, and in the campaign Lee persuasively argued he alone was qualified to fix it.
"I know what you want so well," he told the nation last night, after his opponents had conceded. "I will revive Korea's economy at the bidding of the people. I will unify our society, which has been torn apart."
Having held a commanding lead in opinion polls for months, Lee won with 48.7 percent of the vote, nearly double the 26.2 percent garnered by his closest competitor, Chung Dong-young. In his broadly based win, Lee appeared to have drawn almost equally from young and older voters, gaining strong support from rural and urban areas alike.
Lee is the first corporate executive to be elected president, and his campaign pledges were spreadsheet-specific.
A decade of his pro-business, pro-American policies, Lee vowed, would goose national economic growth to 7 percent a year, double per capita income to $40,000, and catapult South Korea from 13th to seventh among the world's largest economies.
Lee, a former mayor of Seoul who celebrated his 66th birthday on election day, was considerably less precise about how he might accomplish all this, especially because he can serve only one five-year term as president.
The lopsided election made it clear that voters here are willing to look beyond the allegations of corruption that have swirled for months around Lee and his corporate past.
A state prosecutor had cleared him in early December of all known allegations, but last Sunday a new video clip surfaced in which Lee stated that he had founded a much-investigated firm that defrauded investors. He previously had denied any links to the bankrupt company.
The video prompted the National Assembly (with Lee's approval) on Monday to appoint an independent prosecutor. The investigation must be completed before Lee is sworn in as president of Feb. 25.
The South Korean constitution protects a sitting president from prosecution for crimes other than treason. But it is unclear whether Lee would be immune to an indictment issued while he is president-elect. While insisting he has done nothing wrong, Lee said this week that if he were found at fault in the investigation, he would give up the presidency.
But analysts and diplomats here, noting that the president in South Korea possesses extraordinary legal and political power, said there is a high likelihood that state investigators would clear Lee. 