Is Huh Kyung-young Korea’s Craziest Presidential Candidate Ever?
For anyone that thinks Democrats and Republicans are irresponsible spenders, this guy may have the craziest presidential platform I have seen yet:
Pompously clad in a Joseon-era general’s suit of armor, a longsword in hand, Huh Kyung-young, honorary chief of a little known political party, showed up on horseback at an historic battlefield site northwest of Seoul in August to declare his presidential bid in yet another bout of his unique political gimmickry.
Enacting the Joseon army’s heroic victory over invading Japanese forces at Haengju Fortress in one of the major Imjin War battles (1592-1598), the 71-year-old made a spectacle by playing the role of a national hero who slices the enemies to death and saves the country, in front of journalists and supporters.
He then changed into a sleek business suit and glided back to the audience in his famous Rolls Royce to declare his campaign pledge to run in the 2022 presidential election, solemn-faced throughout the whole event.
The pledges blatantly included a one-shot payment of 100 million won (US$85,258) to everyone aged 18 and above in emergency livelihood assistance upon his presidential victory, along with 1.5 million won in “public dividends” every month.
Huh also promised to give a newlywed couple 100 million won each as a subsidy, plus another 200 million won as a no-interest loan to help them buy a home. Giving birth will bring in another 50 million won per baby, he promised.
Huh said he will do away with 90 percent of the state penitentiary facilities, adopt a system to levy fines proportional to offenders’ wealth and collect “anti-tax evasion taxes” to bankroll his splurge of subsidies if he becomes president.
“Our nation is the world’s 10th-strongest economy, but the level of people’s lives is in 100th place. This attests to the fact that the country is not short on money, but it has a lot of thieves,” he rashly claimed.
Yonhap
You can read more at the link, but it only gets wackier about Huh Kyung-young. He even went to jail before for lying about being engaged to former President Park Geun-hye.
