President Lee faces backlash for praising late Seoul mayor accused of sexual harassment

President Lee Jae Myung has come under fire from opposition politicians for "clearly inflicting secondary harm on a victim of sexual abuse by a person in power" in praising the late former Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon in a Sunday social media post on the importance of communication.

"Korea is falling apart both at home and abroad," opposition People Power Party (PPP) chief spokesperson Rep. Park Sung-hoon said in a statement Monday. "What is even more appalling is the president's distorted understanding of communication. President Lee praised former Seoul Mayor Park as an 'outstanding ideas man.'"

Lee had mentioned the former mayor in a post on X and expressed his commitment to communicating with the public through social media.

"I am reminded of the late Mayor Park,” Lee wrote. “He was the one who taught me the importance of communication and social media as a means of achieving it.”

"Polluting spaces for communication with verbal abuse, insults and mockery is not communication but an obstruction of it."

The former mayor, who held office from 2011 until his death in 2020, was accused of sexually harassing a former secretary. He was found dead in an apparent suicide shortly after the allegations surfaced, and the criminal investigation was closed following his death. In 2021, the National Human Rights Commission of Korea concluded that Park Won-soon had sexually harassed the employee, a finding upheld by a Seoul court in 2022.

"The president has held up a man whom the National Human Rights Commission found responsible for sexual harassment as his mentor in communication," Rep. Park said. "The president, who previously apologized for secondary harm inflicted on the victim, is now undermining that apology by putting his personal memories first."

"Did he bow his head before the victim during the election, only to reminisce about a man found responsible for misconduct once he gained power?" the lawmaker continued. "Was his apology merely a means of winning votes?"

Rep. Park also noted that “the public elected a president, not a social media commentator who spends all day posting comments and engaging in political arguments.”

"[The president] must stop treating the nation's highest office as an outlet for his personal emotions and a political playground for his supporters,” he said.

PPP leader Jang Dong-hyeok also criticized President Lee during a party leadership meeting at the National Assembly on Monday.

"Now that 'Moon-Cho-Teol-Rae-Yu' are beating him up, he is name-dropping everyone, from former President Roh Moo-hyun to former Mayor Park, in an attempt to gain recognition as the legitimate heir to the left," Jang said, referring to five hard-line figures in the broader ruling camp: former President Moon Jae-in, former Rebuilding Korea Party leader Cho Kuk, YouTuber Kim Ou-joon, Democratic Party (DP) Rep. Jung Chung-rae and Rhyu Si-min, a former health minister and liberal political commentator.

"President Lee calls this communication, but not a single citizen sees it that way," Jang continued. "How can it be communication when he ignores every public demand for a change in the direction of his administration, says only what he wants to say and caters exclusively to his own supporters?"

PPP Rep. Ahn Cheol-soo also condemned Lee's remarks in a Facebook post on Sunday.

"President Lee's post on X today is a clear act of secondary harm," Ahn wrote, urging Lee to "delete it immediately and apologize."

"President Lee, sexual offenses took place at the very official residence where you met Park Won-soon," Ahn said. "At the place where you say you chatted about social media, Park Won-soon sent obscene messages and vulgar photos to a young secretary and sexually harassed her."

"I have read the book written by the victim," Ahn continued. "She suffered for years and has only now begun taking steps toward recovery."

"And yet you say you miss a sex offender,” he said. “After abolishing prosecutors' supplementary investigative powers, are you now seeking to rehabilitate Park Won-soon's reputation as well? Are you trying to become the president of criminals?"

Rep. Ahn also brought up that DP lawmakers referred to the victim as “a person claiming to be a victim” at the time.

"Have you forgotten how Democratic Party lawmakers treated the victim at the time by referring to her as a 'person claiming to be a victim'?" Ahn said.

"After Druking-linked Kim Kyoung-soo, are you now considering rehabilitating fellow sex offenders Oh Keo-don and An Hee-jung as well?" he added, referring to the case concerning the former South Gyeongsang governor convicted of colluding with political blogger Kim Dong-won, better known by his online alias Druking, of rigging opinion polls in the 2017 presidential election. He was pardoned in 2022 and had his political rights restored in 2024.

Oh, a former DP-affiliated Busan mayor, resigned his mayoral position in 2020 after being sentenced to three years in prison for sexually assaulting female employees. He was released in June 2024 after serving his sentence.

An was a former South Chungcheong governor convicted of sexually assaulting his secretary and was sentenced to three years and six months in prison in 2019. He was released in August 2022 after serving his sentence.

"A president's words carry a different weight," Rep. Ahn added. "They should not be so frivolous as to draw inspiration from the social media activities of a mere sex offender."

Independent Rep. Han Dong-hoon also weighed in on Facebook on Sunday.

"President Lee, the president of Korea must not publicly glorify former Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon, who committed a sexual offense by abusing his position of power and took his own life without apologizing to the victim," Han wrote. "I'm on a plane heading to the United States for a parliamentary audit, but I felt so strongly that this was wrong that I had to tell you to come to your senses."

Criticism also came from the liberal Justice Party.

"I would like to ask the president, 'While reminiscing about Park Won-soon, did you not once think of the victim of the sexual abuse he committed through his position of power?'" Justice Party spokesperson Kim Na-yul said in a statement on Sunday. "President Lee must apologize for glorifying Park Won-soon, a perpetrator of sexual violence."

Former Justice Party Rep. Jang Hye-yeong echoed the criticism in a Facebook post the same day.

"Former Mayor Park was a perpetrator of sexual violence who abused his position of power to sexually harass his secretary," the former lawmaker said. "The president is free to hold whatever personal opinion he wants of Park Won-soon, but publicly glorifying him is an entirely different matter."

The sexual assault survivor of the "Busan roundhouse kick" attack in 2022, where a man knocked down a woman with a kick to rape and murder her, also criticized Lee in a post on X on Sunday.

"Now he's even inflicting secondary harm," the victim wrote, referring to the president. "I'm so disgusted I can't bear to watch anymore."

BY CHO MUN-GYU [[email protected]]