What Moon Jae-in must do

The main opposition Democratic United Party has named Rep. Moon Jae-in as its candidate for the December presidential election. Despite controversy over the process for the party primaries that allowed mobile phone voting, he clinched the nomination by promoting himself as the right candidate for the party. A former chief of staff and long-time confidant of the late President Roh Moo-hyun, Moon dominated the race by sweeping the 13 regional primaries mainly thanks to a strategic choice by pro-Roh groups.

The party leadership will let Moon exercise all the power over the supreme council until Election Day. It also gave him full power to run the party, making chairman Lee Hae-chan and floor leader Park Jie-won retreat from the leadership. The first litmus test for Moon’s political capabilities is to mend the deep rift between the pro-Roh faction and other groups. In his campaign in Seoul Sunday, Moon urged the party to “change to the level of the people’s sight.” By breaking the “Roh Moo-hyun frame,” he should act to show that his call for change is not mere rhetoric.

Moon is not yet a presidential candidate who will be officially registered on the ballots for Dec. 19, the day of the election. While the party needs to respond, the process for unifying the opposition candidate if Ahn Cheol-soo, a former IT guru-turned-professor, declares his candidacy in a couple of days. Two types of unifying the opposition candidacy are being proposed: the Kim Dae-jung-Kim Jong-pil style of 1997 and the Roh Moo-hyun-Chung Mong-joon competition of 2002. Others talk of forming a coalition government in which one takes the presidency and the other the post of prime minister. Unification of the candidate, however, could backfire if it proceeds based on political calculation and fail to bring about convincing policy sharing between the two sides.

Though the main opposition party seeks to retake the presidential mansion, it failed to field its own candidate for the gubernatorial election in Gyeonggi Province in June 2010. Last year, it lost the unified opposition candidacy to independent runner Park Won-soon in the Seoul mayoral by-election. Voices in the party warn that the party, which has 60 years of history and won two presidencies, could be reduced to an election engineer. Moon must assume the heavy responsibility of overcoming the party’s identity crisis with his vision for administration and competitiveness as the presidential candidate. The fates of both the party and Moon depend on what kind of leadership he demonstrates to mend internal rifts and proving the party`s capability of winning power.

While Moon attacks the perception of past history of ruling Saenuri Party candidate Park Geun-hye, he will find it difficult to open up his own path just by blasting Park`s defense of her father`s dictatorial rule. As a key member of the failed Roh administration, Moon cannot give hope to the people without showing his own vision for the future. His political fate will depend on what he can do.