South Korea Suddenly, A New Day

By William R. Doerner

The speaker at an executive council meeting of South Korea's ruling Democratic Justice Party had labored over his speech at home all weekend. He dictated the final version to his secretary, who drafted a single handwritten copy. So when Party Chairman Roh Tae Woo got up to speak last week and pulled that piece of paper from his suit-jacket pocket, virtually no one in the crowded room was aware that history was about to be made.

In the 39 years of often fractious political life since South Korea became a republic, there had never been a policy reversal so sweeping and so totally unexpected. Roh announced he had decided to support the direct election of South Korea's next President, thereby acceding in a single stroke to the principal demand of thousands of protesters who had turned cities throughout the country into scenes of nightly combat during the three previous weeks. What is more, said Roh, he would recommend that President Chun Doo Hwan agree to a list of other democratic reforms, including freedom of the press, the release of political prisoners and self-government for universities. Said one incredulous leader of the Democratic Justice Party: "I thought he was reading the opposition's platform."

Roh's bombshell caught nearly everyone by surprise. The government- controlle d television network, which was broadcasting a cooking show at the time, hastily cut away to air the last part of the 22-minute speech. Journalists who called Chun's office seeking reaction found they had to fill in the presidential press secretary about what had just happened before the spokesman could respond. Newspapers rushed extra editions into print.

In a television address two days later, Chun endorsed the reforms, virtually guaranteeing National Assembly approval of those that require it. "Our politics must now cast aside its old shabby ways, which are incongruous with our level of economic development, and thus achieve an advanced form of democracy that we can proudly show to the world," said Chun. "The general public has an ardent desire to choose the President directly."

Reaction to Chun's about-face ranged from unreserved jubilance to dark skepticism. "This is the year of the political miracle," said Kim Young Sam, leader of the Reunification Democratic Party, the principal opposition group. "I think he has given us all that we wanted." The other major opposition leader, Kim Dae Jung, was more reserved. Having spent most of the past seven years in prison, under house arrest or in exile, Kim would go no further than to declare that "people's power has brought this about." Park Chan Jong, chairman of the main opposition party's policy committee, was more dubious still. Said he: "Many things cannot be seen by the eyes and are very difficult to change by law."

Yet most South Koreans seemed inclined to view the reform package as a ^ good-faith offer. "We have finished the first struggle," said one student leader. "Now let's see how it turns out." For the first time in more than three weeks, riot police disappeared from the streets, and cities were generally quiet.

In Washington, both the Administration and legislators expressed relief over the break in South Korea's political crisis. With its close and long- standing ties to the Seoul government, the U.S. had been deeply concerned it would be blamed for any excessive force used in quelling the demonstrations. While U.S. officials insisted they had not played any part in drafting the measures offered by Roh, they nonetheless lost no time in congratulating him. Said Gaston Sigur, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, who visited Seoul in the midst of the crisis: "Many Americans have looked forward to just such an opening as has now taken place."

By far the most intriguing question was precisely how such an "opening" was engineered by two men who had previously ruled it out. On April 13, Chun had abruptly decreed an end to debate on constitutional reform until after next year's Summer Olympics in Seoul. That move was effusively endorsed by Roh, a classmate of Chun's at South Korea's military academy and a fellow ex- army general. Paying tribute to Chun's "keen perception of history," Roh on June 10 was formally chosen as the Democratic Justice Party's candidate for President in a national election set for later this year. It was Roh's nomination ceremony, which many South Koreans viewed as an arrogant attempt to push a Chun crony into the presidency, that touched off the largest protests.

Chun put Roh in charge of finding a political solution to the crisis, an assignment that few took seriously in a system dominated by presidential authority. Kim Young Sam, for example, insisted on meeting with Chun and pointedly refused to deal with his designated successor. But Roh began holding talks with lower-ranking members of the opposition, as well as a wide range of other South Koreans. Roh says he did not convey his momentous conclusion to Chun before going public with it on Monday. Longtime observers of the South Korean political scene, however, find that contention hard to believe. Says a Western diplomat in Seoul: "In an Asian culture such as this, it is unthinkable that he would take such a step without consulting the President."

It is possible, of course, that the thinking of the two old friends evolved along similar lines, and that nothing specific needed to be said. Both were acutely aware that a long siege of unrest in South Korea could force the International Olympic Committee to schedule the Games elsewhere, damaging for years to come the image of a mature and stable nation that they hoped to project in the Olympic spotlight. Both men also realized that their options to deal with the protests were severely limited by Washington's insistence that military force not be used.

The joint-realization theory is supported by a ruling party Assembly member who is a close friend of Roh's. "The two can read each other's minds," he says. "They are that close. Both realized the urgency of the situation." The State Department's Sigur reported finding an emerging consensus. Sigur recounted last week that during his visit, "I had the sense from everyone, including the President, that changes had to come." In any case, Roh was evidently confident enough to close his speech by vowing that if Chun did not accept his recommendations, he would resign from all his political positions.

The easiest part of Roh's reform package to put into effect is also the one that caused the most contention: direct election of the President. All sides agree that South Korea's electoral college, which under current law makes the final selection of a chief executive, will be abolished and replaced with a simple majority-vote system. A constitutional amendment providing for such measures is expected to win easy approval in the Assembly and in a nationwide referendum, which will likely be held in October.

More problematic will be the drafting of electoral reforms, which Roh said were necessary "so that freedom of candidacy and fair competition are guaranteed." The legislation will be aimed not so much at blatant electoral frauds like ballot-box stuffing, which is relatively rare in South Korea, as at more sophisticated abuses associated with the ruling party. These include patronage in the appointment of local officials and domination of the state- owned television network. Opposition leaders predict that the ruling party will resist agreeing to more than token bills aimed at banning such practices, Roh's promises notwithstanding, and that these measures will be the nub of the political debate in the months to come. Says Lee Chul, a former student leader and protest veteran: "Old habits die hard."

One of the most popular of Roh's proposed reforms is freedom of the press. At ( present, newspapers and journalists are licensed by the government, leading to a rigorous system of self-censorship. The informal "guidelines" about what can be published are so embarrassing to the government that last December it prosecuted three journalists who published a partial listing of them (example: photographs of opposition leaders are prohibited). Roh proposed abolishing the license requirement and doing away with most of the guidelines.

Nothing in Roh's speech raised more questions than the political rehabilitation of Kim Dae Jung, the grand old man of the opposition. Indeed, Kim's status may be one of the few points of contention between Roh and Chun. Roh went out of his way to declare "I do not have any personal animosity toward Kim Dae Jung." By contrast, the President, who is known to share an abiding hatred of Kim with many others in the South Korean establishment, failed to mention his name.

Chun's snub was not the only dilemma facing Kim Dae Jung. As a presidential candidate in 1971, Kim collected 46% of the vote, and remains a formidable political force. But last year, at the request of Seoul's Roman Catholic Archbishop Stephen Cardinal Kim Sou Hwan, the devoutly Catholic Kim sought to break the constitutional debate by promising not to take part in this year's elections, even if his political rights were restored. Going back on such a promise would be personally and politically painful, but some politicians predict that Kim, 63, will find it difficult to pass up the chance, perhaps his last, to try for the presidency. Says one: "To eliminate that yearning from him is to ask him to drop dead."

Roh and Kim Young Sam, on the other hand, were already behaving as if the campaign were under way and they were its front runners. On the day of his speech, Roh journeyed to a national cemetery on the outskirts of Seoul and burned incense in honor of South Korea's war dead. Then he visited a military hospital at which riot police injured in the demonstrations are recovering, and a second hospital, where he commiserated with the father of a student lying in a coma as the result of an injury suffered in the protests. For his part, Kim visited two prisons to assure political detainees that, under new government decrees, they will be freed. On Thursday, Roh and Kim held their first official meeting, discussing preparations for constitutional negotiations.

Kim Young Sam may enjoy an overall advantage at the beginning of the % campaign, if only because he is seen by many South Koreans as the only alternative to an unhappy status quo. But he is widely distrusted by leaders of the student movement, as are most politicians, and has been criticized in the past as being pompous. Kim's biggest potential problem is a split in the opposition forces, which are riddled with internal disagreements. Such disunity could allow Roh to win office with a plurality but not a majority.

With his dramatic announcement last week, Roh has become "the man of the hour" in South Korea, as one government official put it. But he also faces some problems. For one thing, the ex-general will be leading a party that has become widely unpopular for its close association with the military. For another, he is still identified as one of the commanders who ordered the military to quell the 1980 uprising in Kwangju that resulted in at least 180 deaths. For all this, however, Roh seems convinced that his best chance is to run as the man who put aside partisanship and found a way out of a national political crisis. "He never would have announced this thing unless he thought he had a chance under it," says a Western diplomat. Because of Roh or Chun or both, South Korea suddenly has a chance as well.

With reporting by S. Chang and Barry Hillenbrand/Seoul