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South Korean President Moon Jae-in gives his New Year’s address at the Blue House on Jan. 11. (Blue House photo pool)

The key words for governance that South Korean President Moon Jae-in highlighted in his New Year’s address on Jan. 11, were “recovery” and “inclusion.” This shows that Moon means to counter the threat posed by COVID-19, repair economic damage, and strengthen the social safety net.

Moon made no mention of his campaign for prosecutorial reform and his war on real estate speculation, topics that he emphasized during his three previous New Year’s addresses, between 2018 and 2020. As he enters the fifth year of his presidency, Moon seems more focused on overcoming COVID-19 and economic recovery than on institutional reform and change.

“The long battle with COVID-19 has not come to an end,” Moon acknowledged in the address, which he delivered at the Blue House on the morning of Jan. 11. “However, this year will be clearly different.”

The word that appeared most commonly in Moon’s speech on the New Year was “recovery,” a total of 15 times. That conveys Moon’s determination to quickly overcome the economic pain and hardship that the protracted pandemic has inflicted upon the Korean people, so that they can return to their normal lives.

As a concrete step toward that recovery, Moon pledged to provide the COVID-19 vaccine to the South Korean public free of charge.

“Our most urgent task is returning to normal routines free of masks,” Moon said. “We will see to it that all citizens will be inoculated free of charge, starting with those prioritized.”

While the government has previously considered providing free inoculations to high-priority groups, such as medical workers and the elderly, Moon used his address to announce a plan to extend free inoculations to the entire public.

“Even with the improvements in the national economy, however, it will take more time for employment to rebound and for small business owners and the self-employed to recover from the losses they’ve sustained. More than anything else, it is important to accomplish an inclusive recovery plan that eases the disparities deepened further by COVID-19,” Moon said.

Moon also emphasized his determination to execute previously announced policies. These policies include investing 30.5 trillion won (US$27.68 billion) in job creation during the first quarter, allowing workers in the gig economy to enroll in employment insurance, nixing regulations that prevent people struggling financially from receiving state benefits if they have relatives capable of supporting them, introducing benefits for sickness and injury, and expanding the national health insurance net to cover the entire public.

While Moon voiced his determination to “win the war against real estate speculation” in last year’s address, this time around, he apologized for uncertainty in the real estate market, using the word “regrettable.”

“It is truly regrettable that housing-related hardships have immensely disappointed the people. We will never hesitate to devise measures necessary to stabilize housing.”

Moon also signaled a shift in his administration’s real estate policy. “In particular, with a focus on expanding supply, we will quickly work out various housing supply plans that can take effect immediately,” he said.

Moon made no mention of prosecutorial reform, which has been one of the key reform initiatives of his administration. Instead, he stressed consolidating the institutional changes that have already been made.

“The reform of law enforcement agencies is about putting checks and balances in place. [. . .] Last year, we finally fulfilled the long-awaited task of legal and institutional reforms,” Moon said, promising to take the necessary measures to help the reformed systems take root.

Moon didn’t mention a much-discussed proposal to extend pardons to former Presidents Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye, both of whom are currently in prison. That appears to reflect the Supreme Court’s pending verdict in Park’s case, which the court is scheduled to return on Jan. 14.

Last year, Moon had enthusiastically voiced his determination to improve inter-Korean relations, mentioning the idea of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un paying a return visit to Seoul. But this year, Moon didn’t devote much of his address to inter-Korean relations.

“Our determination to meet at any time and any place and talk even in a contact-free manner remains unchanged,” Moon said, calling for the creation of a “community of peace, security and life” based on collaboration on COVID-19 and public health issues.

Beyond recovery and inclusion, Moon laid out a vision of making Korea a “pace-setting nation.” As a way to overcome the climate crisis, Moon proposed fleshing out his plan for achieving carbon neutrality by 2050 while also securing “a commanding position in the global market” through “the hydrogen economy and low-carbon industry ecosystem.”

Moon also promised that Korea would take the lead in soft power. Along those lines, he mentioned prominent Korean athletes such as Son Heung-min, Ryu Hyun-jin and Ko Jin-young as well as the music groups BTS and Blackpink and the film “Parasite,” which achieved great popularity both domestically and internationally last year.

In his speech, Moon mentioned several factors that will help Korea overcome the hardship of the pandemic: the success of Korea’s response to the decease, the fact that Korea has the highest growth rate among OECD members, the growth of the per capita income, and the strong performance of the Korean stock index: share prices have soared recently.

But critics have pointed out that such figures fail to address Korea’s intensifying wealth polarization and inequality and the work-related fatality rate, which is the highest in the OECD. As such, they say, Moon failed to demonstrate his commitment to “recovery” and “inclusion.”

“Moon’s advantage during the first half of his presidency was relatability and communication. Considering that so many people are currently facing severe hardship, I think Moon’s speech would have been more persuasive if he’d honestly owned up to the government’s responsibility for that,” said Yun Tae-gon, senior political analyst for the think tank Moa.

By Lee Wan, staff reporter

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