South Korean Election Rivets in L.A.

As a U.S. citizen, James Oh, a real estate broker from Cerritos, can’t vote in Thursday’s South Korean presidential election. But that hasn’t kept him or hundreds of other Korean Americans in the Los Angeles area from campaigning for the two major-party candidates vying to succeed South Korean President Kim Dae Jung.

“Korea is in my heart,” said Oh, who has been at Los Angeles International Airport near the Korean Air ticket counter nearly every day for the last three weeks in an attempt to influence Korean travelers returning to Seoul.

“Whether we live in Los Angeles or Seoul, who becomes the next president will impact us,” said Oh, who has lived in the United States since 1982.

From 7,000 miles away, supporters of Roh Moo Hyun, candidate of the ruling Millennium Democratic Party, and Lee Hoi Chang of the conservative opposition, the Grand National Party, have been hard at work since Nov. 26, the start of the official campaign period in South Korea.

Tonight supporters of both sides plan to gather at two Koreatown hotels to watch election returns into the wee hours of the morning. Recent polls have shown the race to be very close.

The outcome of the election also could alter the political map of the Los Angeles Korean American community -- the nation’s largest. Los Angeles and Seoul are like two sides of a coin. Family, school, church, business and political ties bind them.

Since its beginnings three decades ago, Los Angeles’ Koreatown has been dominated by conservatives with money, some with close business and political ties to South Korea. Many leading figures in Koreatown are also staunch anti-Communists who support the U.S. military presence in South Korea -- positions that are generally in line with Lee’s thinking.

A victory by Roh, therefore, could mean a significant realignment in Koreatown power politics. His supporters are generally younger, more liberal and lack close ties to the established Koreatown power brokers, such as those involved in the Korean American Federation of Los Angeles.

Being the president of the Korean American Federation of Los Angeles is akin to being the ceremonial mayor of Koreatown -- the person who greets visiting dignitaries from Korea and represents the community to the outside world. Half of the dozen people who have served as federation president have used the position as a steppingstone to seek a political appointment or office in South Korea.

Both campaigns have strong Los Angeles ties.

Walter Park, a former Koreatown real estate agent and talk show host, is in charge of media relations for Lee. Jay K. Yoo, a former Koreatown attorney who returned to South Korea to become a talk show host and then became a member of the National Assembly, holds a similar post in Roh’s campaign.

Park and Yoo are graduates of the prestigious Kyunggi Boys’ High School, with many friends, former classmates and supporters in Los Angeles. The school also counts Lee as a graduate. Among many immigrant Koreans, school ties are a major bond.

For Los Angeles’ large and heavily immigrant Korean American community, the presidential election in South Korea is the best distraction in town.

Political talk dominates conversations at Koreatown businesses, health clubs and churches. Election news fills Korean-language newspapers and TV and radio broadcasts.

Last week, large contingents of supporters of each candidate left for Seoul. They will remain there through the election.

Some are seeking political or business gain -- competing for an appointment in the new administration or hoping to win business opportunities. Others want to make connections with the winning camp that would establish them as power brokers in Koreatown, or at least guarantee front-row seats when South Korean dignitaries visit Los Angeles.

Many other Korean Americans believe the election will usher in a new era for South Korean politics because it is the first in which the three politicians named Kim -- President Kim Dae Jung, former President Kim Young Sam and former Prime Minister Kim Jong Pil, who have dominated South Korean politics for more than three decades -- are out of the picture.

The hope for change in the Korean political system is what drives Oh to spend his time and money to work the homebound travelers at LAX, he says.

A vote for Roh represents a clean break from old politics and old leaders, Oh has been telling any Korean willing to listen.

Roh is good for Korea’s future because he is able to overcome regional rivalry that has plagued South Korean politics for so long, he says.

Across town in the Mid-Wilshire district, businessman Walter Ik Hyun Cho, 67, has been working the phones every chance he has had to put in a good word for Lee.

A vote for Lee represents experience, stability and a clean government, Cho says.

Lee’s many years in public life -- as a supreme court justice, prime minister, national assemblyman and head of the South Korean equivalent of the General Accounting Office -- outclasses Roh, he says.

In the last 10 days, supporters of Lee and Roh have held big fund-raisers in Koreatown hotels that drew hundreds.

Many find themselves tugged in two directions.

Sung Cha Cho, a social worker who runs a counseling agency in Koreatown, went to both dinners.

She attended Lee’s dinner to please her friends, she said, and Roh’s to please “my heart, which is for candidate Roh.”