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AnalysisYoon faces uphill battle to regain public trust

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President Yoon Suk-yeol speaks during a Cabinet meeting at Yongsan presidential office, Aug. 12. Aug. 17 will mark the 100th day since his inauguration. Joint Press Corps
President Yoon Suk-yeol speaks during a Cabinet meeting at Yongsan presidential office, Aug. 12. Aug. 17 will mark the 100th day since his inauguration. Joint Press Corps

Experts advise Yoon to listen to criticism, be flexible

By Ko Dong-hwan

Times are tough for President Yoon Suk-yeol, who is set to mark his 100th day in office on Wednesday. His approval rating is lower than that of any of his predecessors. He was sworn in as president on May 10 amid the COVID-19 pandemic, which entered its third year and dealt a blow to self-employed people, among other victims. The recent flood that ripped through Seoul and its adjacent regions has also created plenty of new challenges.

His celebration of 100 days in the presidency also comes as his ties with the ruling People Power Party (PPP) have become strained, as the defiant young Chairman Lee Jun-seok, who was suspended from party affairs for six months, vowed to cling onto power, causing further damage to Yoon and his close aides.

"His public endorsement of 'principles' and 'beliefs' as a former prosecutorial chief may have earned him public trust during the presidential campaign," Yoo Sung-jin, a political analyst and a professor at Ewha Womans University, told The Korea Times. "But now, what he has shown through the selection of controversial nominees as key aides (including Education Minister Park Soon-ae), and his unbridled comments have damaged that trust. The most lamentable fact is that he doesn't seem to recognize the gravity of his own words and actions."

Yoon is rather relying on "negative" factors such as meeting the expectations of his extreme far-right supporters who despise the previous Moon Jae-in administration, rather than "positive" factors like making efforts to create policies to earn the public's undivided support, according to Hong Hyeng-sik, the president of Hangil Research Center, a local political analyst group.

"Because of his habit of decision-making based solely on a legal point of view, his style of statecraft turns out to be 'managerial' rather than reflecting legitimate 'governance'," Hong said. "It's the same with how he views the National Assembly and members of the public. To him, they are just subjects of legal judgment rather than sovereign entities to respect or key players in a democracy."

Many observers have expressed their concerns about how the Yoon Suk-yeol administration differs from previous governments. Yoo and Hong, in that vein, both pointed out that Yoon seems to have neglected securing public trust during the first 100 days of his presidency.

"He is worse than any other past president," said Yoo. "The first 100 days of the past presidents have commonly shown the incumbents' efforts to appeal to the public by reminding them what their president has accomplished so far and thus advertising what they will accomplish from now on and earn their trust. The Yoon administration, however, hasn't shown such efforts whatsoever."

Hong pointed out that the usual "honeymoon period" the past presidents had enjoyed with main opposition party politicians and the public during the early phases of their administrations was apparently too short for Yoon.

"That's because the reasons behind the serious decline in public approval ratings for Yoon (which plummeted to the lowest level of below 30 percent last week) do not come from outside of his administration," said Hong. "They directly come from inside his own party and office." The analyst was referring to the ruling PPP's ongoing cataclysmic internal division led by the former chairman against Yoon and his alleged henchmen popularly called "Yoon's core aides" as well as many controversial nominations and appointments of personnel for the presidential office and his Cabinet.

President Yoon Suk-yeol visits a flooded semi-basement home in the Silim-dong area in Seoul's district of Gwanak, Aug. 9. Yoon was criticized for going home and not staying at his office during torrential rainfall that lasted for days. Joint Press Corps
President Yoon Suk-yeol visits a flooded semi-basement home in the Silim-dong area in Seoul's district of Gwanak, Aug. 9. Yoon was criticized for going home and not staying at his office during torrential rainfall that lasted for days. Joint Press Corps

What will turn the tables for Yoon, according to the observers, is simple: listening to the public. His uncompromising stances, they argue, derive from his many years as one of the country's legion of prosecutors, who are neither accustomed to following orders from above nor adept at accepting criticism.

"Most members of the public aren't in favor of how Yoon is governing the country," said Yoo. "That means his former occupation is having a negative effect. If the current situation continues for Yoon where no one is guiding him with acerbic but necessary advice, he will become the country's worst president ever."

"Communication should go both ways, but for Yoon, it seems to go one way," said Hong. "His policies don't get support from the public, meaning they aren't appealing to them. Without a roadmap, his administration doesn't exactly know under which visions and policies they should lead the country yet. Such a problem will only get more serious because of the series of controversial selections of his key aides."


Ko Dong-hwan aoshima11@koreatimes.co.kr


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