Blunders

Two presidents met their downfall last week. Their political decline was of their own making.

South Korea’s parliament voted to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol for his clumsy attempt to put the country under martial rule last Dec. 3. While soldiers tried to occupy the parliament building, legislators managed to hold a midnight session to reject the martial law order. Yoon was forced to withdraw the order four hours after it was issued – the shortest martial rule episode in history.

The parliament is controlled by the opposition Democratic Party although several members of Yoon’s own party voted for impeachment. The proceedings will probably take a few more months at the Constitutional Court, but Yoon is forced to give up his presidential powers immediately. Prime Minister Han Duck-soo takes over as acting president.

A mammoth crowd assembled before the parliament building as the vote was being taken. People cheered wildly as the unpopular president was impeached.

Yoon’s two years in office were turbulent ones. He was constantly besieged with scandals and undermined by his very low approval ratings.

Since taking office, Yoon faced political gridlock. He was unable to push forward legislation with the parliament dominated by the political opposition. Frustrated with the political deadlock, Yoon tried more forceful tactics, including police raids on several media outlets and the homes of journalists he accused of spreading “fake news.”

Accusing the opposition of “anti-state” activities, he eventually declared martial rule to break the deadlock. The move backfired spectacularly, culminating in last week’s impeachment vote.

From the very first moments martial rule was imposed, South Koreans took to the streets to protest. It is not easy to forget the long years of brutal dictatorship in this country. Although those years of political repression set the stage for South Korea’s emergence as an industrial power, most Koreans saw no justification for resorting to martial rule at this time.

Yoon’s defense minister, Kim Yong-hun, is said to have recommended the imposition of martial rule. Prosecutors have since detained the resigned minister. Last week, in detention, Kim tried to take his own life.

The parliament had earlier impeached Yoon’s justice minister and police chief. In the initial inquiries into what happened, the Special Warfare commander admitted the he received direct orders from Yoon to break into the National Assembly and drag out the legislators attempting to convene.

The attempt to impose martial law was badly planned and poorly executed. Yoon will certainly pay the price for this bungled attempt. But as South Korea sorts out its domestic politics, the country will be vulnerable.

Miscalculated

The political quagmire that now engulfs French President Emmanuel Macron need not have happened if the man was a little more prudent. But he imagines himself a Napoleon of sorts.

After the right-wing parties scored significant gains in European Parliament elections earlier this year, Macron rashly decided to dissolve the French National Assembly and call for snap elections. Somehow, he imagined that early elections will break the momentum of the right-wing parties and enable his centrist coalition to improve their numbers in parliament. This was a serious miscalculation.

The snap election held last July saw a rapidly polarizing electorate. The leftist and centrist parties had to negotiate single-candidate arrangements in many districts just to stop the far-right juggernaut. In the end, both the leftist and rightist parties improved their numbers at the expense of the centrist parties.

Macron wanted to strengthen his grip over the National Assembly. He ended up decimating the centrists. His choice for prime minister was vulnerable from the start.

The centrist prime minister, Michel Barnier, was brought down last week by a vote of no-confidence. That was an ouster just waiting to happen. The leftist and rightist parties have enough votes to oust a centrist leadership whenever they unite on an issue.

The issue that took out Barnier, just three months in office, concerned the passage of the 2025 national budget. The proposed budget contained bitter pills: about 60 billion euros in tax increases and the program to cut the deficit to under five percent of GDP. Barnier also tried to delay matching pension increases to inflation. Both the leftist and rightist parties, with an eye to the next presidential elections, found a populist issue they could espouse.

Without an effective parliamentary majority, Barnier tried to get the budget through without a vote. That triggered the no-confidence motion that removed him from office.

It took several days before Macron could respond to the parliamentary defeat, vetting several possibilities for a unifying prime minister. Last week, he finally appointed Francois Bayrou, a centrist ally who sought the presidency thrice prior to aligning with Macron.

Given the numbers at the National Assembly, it does not seem likely that the new prime minister could win the votes he needs to pass the same otherwise sane budget. Any proposal to increase taxes, indispensable to shoring up France’s fiscal position, will be met with resistance from the leftist and the rightist populists eager to feast on the carcass of Macronism to improve their future electoral chances.

The best Macron’s government could do is to legislate a “fiscal continuity” measure to avoid a shutdown. That will be the equivalent of our reenacting the previous budget.

With only a couple of years left in his term, Macron will effectively be a lame duck.