[KVOLUTION]

Lee Should Heed Calls From His Own Followers

Diverse sectors of society have been calling for President Lee Myung-bak to overhaul his policies and administrative style.

Most noteworthy in recent days were two new groups of critics ― university professors and the governing party's lawmakers belonging to Lee's own faction. Although there are considerable differences between them in how they see the present situation and their respective demands, they have at least one thing in common: Unless Cheong Wa Dae changes, not just the governing camp but the whole nation will end up in serious trouble.

This page has long expressed concerns about various signs of regressing democracy since the Lee administration took office, similar to the worries let out by about 200 professors at Seoul National University and Chung-Ang University Wednesday. So what they said was not exactly new, but reflected widespread sentiment in this society.

What's important for Cheong Wa Dae, however, is these intellectuals have not always been the first group to protest against social or political problems, which, in other words, means that when university professors finally move, there will follow a larger, popular movement. The two most famous examples were academics' declarations in the 1960 student movement and the 1987 democracy protests.

The professors called for President Lee to acknowledge and apologize for the problems related with prosecutors' investigations into the alleged bribery cases involving the late former President Roh Moo-hyun and his family members as well as the prosecution's overall reform. Cheong Wa Dae, however, is reportedly negative about even the resignation of Prosecutor General Lim Chae-jin. Likewise, President Lee Thursday brushed aside requests from a group of young, reform-minded ruling party lawmakers to reshuffle Cabinet and reform the ways state affairs are conducted, saying replacing government ministers for the sake of tiding over a crisis is the ``practice of old politics."

The President may be right, if the situation were not so serious as now. Mechanical, ostensible cabinet reshuffles, in which ministers are replaced with just another group of yes-men, are meaningless, because nothing will fundamentally change unless the chief executive himself changes.

The majority of Koreans now think the inter-Korean relationship has gone back to pre-2000 level, while its democracy has regressed to that of 1987. Over the past 10 years or so, which the Lee administration calls a ``lost decade," at least people were not arrested for criticizing the government on the Internet, or loitering around the sites of protest rallies. Nor did they tremble with fear about looming military clashes between the Koreas.

The people's right to meet and demonstrate is one of the most basic Constitutional rights, but according to the incumbent administration it should only be allowed in rare exceptions. Over the past several months the government has allowed mass rallies, particularly those that are anti-government, quite exceptionally. Koreans have come to beg for the government's magnanimity in getting what is theirs.

It would be a grave mistake for the government to think that the calls for more democracy will be over when the aftermath of the late Roh's funeral dies down. The former President's death has just exemplified popular grievances, which have long been accumulated.

Cheong Wa Dae should not be a citadel of the ruling elite's obduracy, but we are afraid it is becoming one.