Park Geun-hye / Choi Soon-sil scandal (2012): Park elected · 545

Park Geun-hye / Choi Soon-sil scandal In 2016 Korean reporting showed that Choi Soon-sil had used her access to President Park Geun-hye to shake companies and warp state decisions. Candlelight crowds, impeachment and convictions followed. In the autumn of 2016, South Korean newsrooms — especially JTBC, which reported on a tablet computer tied to Choi Soon-sil — showed that a long-time confidante of President Park Geun-hye had reviewed presidential speeches, leaned on conglomerates for money and used state power as a private channel. Choi was not an elected official. Park, daughter of former president Park Chung-hee, had won the 2012 election as the conservative Saenuri candidate. The scandal collapsed her presidency.

From late October 2016 through March 2017, Saturday candlelight protests filled Seoul streets, including Gwanghwamun. The National Assembly passed an impeachment motion on 9 December 2016. The Constitutional Court upheld it unanimously on 10 March 2017, removing Park from office. A snap election made Moon Jae-in president. Special prosecutors and criminal courts then tried Park, Choi and business figures including Samsung's Lee Jae-yong on bribery and abuse-of-power theories.

Park was convicted in 2018 and received a long prison term, later adjusted on appeal; Moon pardoned her in December 2021 on health and reconciliation grounds. Choi was also convicted. The status is convicted: courts named crimes. The pardon is aftermath, not an acquittal. English-language papers framed the candlelight weeks as a peaceful 'candlelight revolution' and sometimes reached for Watergate or Rasputin metaphors; the Korean civic fact is a constitutional removal after mass, non-war protest.