Roh Moo-hyun

Roh Moo-hyun (Korean: Roh Moo-hyun/Roh Moo-hyun, September 1, 1946 - May 23, 2009) was a South Korean politician and the 16th President of South Korea. He served as a judge and lawyer before entering politics. Roh Moo-hyun came from a poor family. After finishing junior high school, he did not continue to attend ordinary high school but went to Busan Commercial High School, which provided scholarships. Vocational high school became his final academic qualification, making him the president with the lowest academic qualifications in South Korean history. He is also known as the "civilian president" and "grassroots president". Roh Moo-hyun, who had never entered a university law school, finally passed the judicial examination and became a judge after nearly ten years of tenacious self-study. Due to his interest preference, he became a lawyer soon after becoming a judge. During the Chun Doo-hwan military government, Roh Moo-hyun became a defense lawyer in the "Bulim Incident" by chance, and began his career as a human rights lawyer. In 1988, at the suggestion of Kim Young-sam, Roh Moo-hyun joined the Unification Democratic Party and was elected as a member of the 13th National Assembly of South Korea. In December 2002, he defeated Grand National Party candidate Lee Hoi-chang in the 16th presidential election of South Korea and became the President of the Republic of Korea. In the early days of taking office as president, Roh Moo-hyun struggled to implement various reform policies because the opposition controlled more than half of the seats in Congress. Roh Moo-hyun has been plunged into a crisis of confidence after it was revealed that his associates had accepted political payments during his campaign. At a TV symposium, he was accused of violating the neutrality principle of the Election Law because he said, "I hope the people will strongly support the Open Kuomintang." This led to a crisis in the party and government, and he was eventually impeached by Congress. However, the opposition's impeachment struggle had a negative effect among the South Korean people. The newly established party Open KMT, which supported Roh Moo-hyun, became the largest party in Congress in the new congressional election. Roh Moo-hyun's position was also restored after South Korea's Constitutional Court rejected the impeachment case. Roh Moo-hyun called his government a "citizen participation government" that would achieve "balanced development of the country" and "peace and prosperity in Northeast Asia" by "expanding citizen participation." Roh Moo-hyun seeks reform while maintaining stability. In terms of administrative reform, he proposed building a "competent government" and a "moderate-scale government." In terms of economic reform, he tried to establish a fair, transparent, and healthy market order. During his administration, Roh Moo-hyun proposed a "peace and prosperity" policy toward North Korea based on the "sunshine policy" of former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung. From October 2 to 4, 2007, Roh Moo-hyun and his wife Kwon Yang-sook walked across the military demarcation line between South Korea and North Korea in Pyongyang to meet with Kim Jong-il, General Secretary of the Workers’ Party of Korea.