Just three years after narrowly losing the presidential election to conservative Yoon Suk Yeol, Lee Jae Myung has emerged, phoenix like, as the likely new leader of South Korea.
Such a prospect appeared unlikely until a few months ago as the leader of the liberal Democratic Party grappled with a raft of legal troubles and scandals.
But after Yoon made a botched attempt to put South Korea under martial law in December and, as a consequence, was impeached out of office, Lee projected himself as a protector of the democratic order and started to gain in public polls.
Now, less than a week out from the 3 June election, Lee, 61, is the clear frontrunner in the race to succeed Yoon in a deeply polarised and politically weary nation.
His rise to the cusp of power, though, also raises a critical question: is he the steady hand South Korea needs when the corruption investigations and abuse of power allegations against him are certain to cast a shadow over his presidency?
Lee, described by his advisers as “gladiator in a suit”, moved quickly into the spotlight as he aggressively countered Yoon’s disastrous martial law decree. He climbed onto the fence of the National Assembly building to evade the then president’s security guards and documented the chaos on a livestream.
Analysts remain sceptical about his ability to provide the stable leadership the country needs. While he is campaigning as a pragmatist focused on domestic issues, his record of confrontational politics, ongoing legal troubles and polarising rhetoric raise doubts about his capacity to unite a divided nation.
“Lee appears to be holding the lead against his main conservative rival. His legal problems cast a shadow, and depending on developments, South Korea’s political leadership problems may continue even if he wins the election,” Naoko Aoki, political scientist at RAND, tells The Independent.
Yoon’s martial law declaration created months of political instability, triggering a wave of public discontent with his People Power Party that Lee is looking to ride into power.
The People Power Party’s Kim Moon Soo has consistently trailed in polls despite projecting himself as a moderate going up against the “harbinger of monster politics and dictatorship”, as he has described Lee. Kim is aware of the need to attract the centrist vote to have a chance against the liberal frontrunner.
Sojin Lim, co-director of Korean Studies at the University of Central Lancashire, offered a bleak picture of the emerging political scenario, arguing that the prospect of Lee winning was concerning. “It does not appear that any of the current presidential candidates have the potential to be effective leaders in South Korea, particularly in addressing the multiple challenges the country faces both domestically and internationally,” she tells The Independent.
“In the case of Lee, the outlook seems even more concerning, given his past leadership style and the ongoing legal cases against him,” he adds.
“His approach has often been confrontational rather than conciliatory, which may not align with the consensus-building leadership South Korea urgently requires.”
Lee has positioned himself as a pragmatic leader, advocating for policies that appeal to a broad electorate. His proposals, addressing calls for reducing presidential powers after Yoon’s actions, include effecting constitutional changes to have a two-term presidency, a run-off election system, and parliamentary nomination of the prime minister.
He also aims to shorten the work week, raise the retirement age, and combat the population crisis with housing and tax benefits for families.
Lim says what sets Lee apart is his populist platform, centred on expansive welfare pledges like a universal basic income which appeal to economically discontented voters but risk deepening existing political divisions.
The liberal leader’s “confrontational rhetoric and polarising leadership style may alienate conservative factions, making bipartisan cooperation difficult in an already fragile political climate”, she explains.
“To govern effectively he would need to temper his populist agenda with inclusive policymaking and deliberate efforts to bridge ideological and/or political divides.”
Lee has sought to resonate with younger voters by donning blue-and-red Reebok sneakers, colours of the national flag. The wearing of those sneakers, which quickly became a coveted commodity after he started wearing them on the campaign trail, was a conscious choice, aimed at playing up one of his pledges to unite South Korea’s liberal and conservative voters.
Lee was born to a family of farmers in a remote mountain village in the country's southeast. He worked in chemical factories as a child, suffering an industrial accident that left him with a permanent injury to his arm and impaired hearing.
He has used his rags-to-riches story on the campaign trail, bringing up his impoverished childhood to focus on economic equality.
He grew up to study law on a scholarship, passed the Bar in 1986 and worked as a human rights and labour lawyer for about two decades.
He made his political debut in 2005 with the Uri Party, a predecessor to the Democratic Party, and was elected mayor of Seongnam, south of Seoul, five years later.
Aiming for higher office, he contested and won the 2018 election for governor of Gyeonggi-do, South Korea's most populous province.
Now, aiming for the presidency, Lee is seeking to reconcile his image as a polarising populist with the more measured, pragmatic tone of his current campaign.
“Lee is running as a pragmatist and his campaign proposals have been less polarising than in the past,” Aoki says. “If he wins, the key thing is whether he can stick to those positions.”
Managing relations with South Korea’s neighbours, especially North Korea and China, is set to be one of the key challenges for the incoming president, regardless of who is elected.
Unlike Yoon, who pursued a more hardline approach towards North Korea, Lee has said he would seek to ease tensions by restoring a military hotline and a military agreement ditched by Pyongyang amid rising animosity in 2023.
“North Korea continues to remain a political focus during the campaigning. No matter who wins in this election, they might have a slight departure from former president Yoon Suk Yeol's hardline approach on North Korea and China,” Dr Jagannath Panda, head of the Stockholm Centre for South Asian and Indo-Pacific Affairs at the Institute for Security and Development Policy in Sweden, tells The Independent.
Aoki says Lee possibly extending an olive branch to Pyongyang is not surprising. “His official platform does not include, for example, grand gestures like inter-Korean summits or economic cooperation but rather focuses on smaller trust-building measures,” she adds.
If he does win, Lee will have to deal with a string of legal cases, including a $1bn property development scandal from his time as Seongnam mayor. In what is known as the “Daejang-dong scandal”, he has been indicted on charges of bribery, corruption, breach of trust, and conflicts of interest.
In another legal case, Lee was convicted last November of violating the election law for making a false statement during a debate in the 2022 presidential campaign. An appeals court overturned Lee’s conviction, but the Supreme Court reinstated it and ordered a new sentence to be handed out. The sentencing, however, was postponed until after the election to avoid influencing the outcome.
Another case is linked to an alleged scheme to use an underwear company to transfer funds to North Korea and facilitate a visit to Pyongyang when he was governor between 2019 and 2020.
Lee has denied wrongdoing in all cases, calling them a “witch hunt” by the People’s Power Party to undermine his political career.
All on board dead after South Korea navy plane crashes near base
Brazil sues Chinese electric carmaker BYD over ‘slave-like’ conditions of workers
Has India really overtaken Japan to become the world’s 4th largest economy?
Southeast Asian leaders hit out at Trump tariffs as China pledges support
Polls show clear favourite in race to become South Korea’s next president
North Korea says Trump’s Golden Dome risks ‘outer space nuclear war’
