Park Geun-hye is South Korea’s 11th and current President, and the first woman to hold such a post in the country’s history. Her father, Park Chung-hee, was South Korea’s third president, military general, and dictator. Following her father’s assassination attempt in 1974, which killed her mother, Park Geun-hye assumed the role of first lady until her father’s assassination in 1979. She has become South Korea’s first female head of state. Prior to becoming president of the country, she served as deputy chairman of the ‘Grand National Party,’ winning election to chair the party following a six-year term. She served in the ‘Korean National Assembly’ as a constituency representative for four consecutive terms beginning in 1998, and then as a proportional representative beginning in June 2012. She was ranked the most powerful woman in East Asia by Forbes magazine in 2013 and 2014.
Childhood and Adolescence
Park Geun-hye was born on February 2, 1952, in Taegu, North Gyeongsang, South Korea, as the first of three children to Park Chung-hee and Yuk Young-soo. Her father was South Korea’s third president, a military general, and a tyrant.Her family relocated to Seoul in 1953, and she spent her childhood in the ‘Blue House,’ the South Korean presidential palace. She received her diploma from Seoul’s Sacred Heart Girls’ High School in 1970.
She earned her bachelor’s degree in electronic engineering from ‘Sogang University’ in 1974. She studied for a time in France at the ‘Grenoble University,’ but returned to South Korea when her mother was slain in an assassination attempt on her father on August 15, 1974 in Seoul’s ‘National Theater of Korea.’ Mun Se-gwang, a member of the ‘General Association of Korean Residents in Japan,’ carried out the assassination.
Park Geun-hye continued to assume the role of first lady until 1979, when her father was assassinated by Kim Jae-gyu, the chief of the ‘Korean Central Intelligence Agency’ (now known as the ‘National Intelligence Service’).
In 1987, she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Literature by the Chinese Culture University in Taipei, Taiwan.
Career of Park
She served in the ‘Korean National Assembly’ as a member of the ‘Grand National Party,’ representing the constituency of Dalseong, Daegu, for four consecutive terms beginning in 1998.In 1998, she was elected deputy chairperson of the ‘Grand National Party.’She twice became the party’s chairman between 2004 and 2006, and she was a key figure in the party’s election campaign, which saw the party defy the odds to win large electoral gains in local elections. The party won a majority in the 2006 elections. She was dubbed “Queen of Elections” by the media.
She was the ‘Grand National Party’ presidential nominee in 2007, but lost to Lee Myung-bak.
In 2008, she was awarded Honorary Doctorates in Science and Politics from ‘KAIST’ in Daejeon, South Korea, and ‘Pukyong National University’ in Busan, South Korea.In 2010, she received an Honorary Doctorate in Politics from Seoul’s ‘Sogang University.’The ‘Grand National Party’ organized an ad hoc emergency committee in 2011, and she was appointed as its head on December 19, 2011. She served as the party’s chairperson from 2011 to 2012.
The ‘Grand National Party’ was renamed the ‘Saenuri Party’ in February 2012, and she began her fifth term as a proportional representative in the ‘Korean National Assembly’ in June 2012.
In August 2012, she was nominated by the ‘Saenuri Party’ as their presidential candidate for the December 2012 presidential election. Moon Jae-In, the nominee of the centre-left ‘Democratic United Party,’ a former human rights lawyer who protested and was imprisoned under her father’s regime in the 1970s, emerged as her leading contender.She won the presidential election on December 19, 2012, and on February 25, 2013, she became South Korea’s first female president. Her government’s objective is “a new era of hope and happiness.”
“Creativity-oriented education and cultural enrichment,” “a jobs-cantered creative economy,” “tailored employment and welfare,” “strong security measures for long-term peace on the Korean Peninsula,” and “a safe and united society” are among the new government’s administrative goals.She made significant reforms, including restructuring the ‘Blue House,’ in order to carry out her administrative vision and aims. Several agencies, including the ‘Ministry of Science,’ the ‘Office of National Security’ at the Blue House, and the ‘ICT and Future Planning,’ were established while the role of ‘Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs’ was renewed.
In May 2013, she paid a visit to the United States and met President Barack Obama. The two presidents held a bilateral meeting to discuss a variety of developmental and cooperation topics, with an emphasis on the expansion of their respective economies. Despite the fact that the United States has over 20,000 military personnel stationed in South Korea, she considers the strategic relationship between the two countries to be the most fruitful.
She called for a united front to face the challenges posed by North Korea while speaking before a joint session of the US Congress. She, like many of her predecessors, maintains a close relationship with the United States.Despite the fact that North Korea violated a ‘UN Security Council’ resolution and caused various problems for South Korea, she remained committed to coordinating policies with the UN, the US, and China on North Korea.In June 2013, she visited China and met President Xi Jinping. She won the President’s support after explaining South Korea’s position on North Korean concerns.
She met with Russian President Vladimir Putin on November 13, 2013, during his visit to South Korea. The two presidents held a lengthy and animated discussion about how to boost economic and political advancements.
On June 5, 2013, she stated her goal of constructing a ‘Creative Economy’ to realize her vision of revitalizing the economy while also creating new jobs.On April 8, 2014, Park Geun-hye and Australia’s Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, signed the ‘Australia Korea Free Trade Agreement.’South Korea applied to join the ‘Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank’ in March 2015, and on May 26, 2015, she addressed the chief of the ‘Asian Development Bank’ to work with the ‘Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank’ as well.
She has stated that one of the nation’s social priorities should be to remove the “Four Major Social Evils,” which include unsafe food, domestic violence, sexual assault, and school violence.She established a ‘National Unity Committee,’ which will advise the president on how to resolve societal disputes in the country, encouraging a climate of prosperity and coexistence.
Estimated Net Worth
Park Geun-Hye is a South Korean politician and author who most recently served as the country’s 11th President. Her net worth is believed to be $7 million. From 2013 until 2017, she was paid roughly $15,000 per month as president. The South Korean president Park Geun-Hye and her close friend Choi Soon-sil were accused of “handing bribes worth almost £30 million to the South Korean president Park Geun-Hye and her close friend Choi Soon-sil to win government favors for a smooth leadership transition” by the Seoul district court in 2017. The South Korean president, Park Geun-Hye, was also impeached by the National Assembly as a result of the incident. Nonetheless, prosecutors have charged Choi Soon-sil, her political aide, with interfering with state affairs and pressuring chaebols to pay tens of millions of dollars to self-controlled organizations and enterprises.