South Korea’s shy new President Moon hits the spotlight. What are his main policy pledges

South Korean liberal human rights lawyer Moon Jae-in won the presidency in an election on Tuesday, exit polls showed, ending nine years of conservative rule. He never felt comfortable being at the Blue House when he was a top aide to the president. He quit in 2004, a year into the job, and went on a long hike in the Himalayas. What are his main policy pledges?

Although he would return to the presidential office a month later, the liberal idealist, who once dreamed of opening a pro-bono law practice in a Korea reunified with the North, says he has always been uneasy in the limelight.

Now he has the eyes of 51 million South Koreans on him after exit polls projected that he won a Tuesday election to succeed the ousted Park Geun-hye as president.

Moon favours dialogue with North Korea to ease rising tension over its accelerating nuclear and missile programmes. He also wants to reform powerful family-run conglomerates, such as Samsung and Hyundai, and boost fiscal spending to create jobs.

Recalling his life at the Blue House in 2003-2008, he said in his 2011 book “Destiny”: “I always felt uncomfortable. I felt that the job was not suitable for me, as if I was wearing clothes that did not fit. I always thought ‘I will go back to my place, a lawyer’.”

A close confidant and a top aide to former liberal President Roh Moo-hyun, Moon said it was his old friend’s apparent suicide in 2009 amid a bribery investigation into his family after his term in office ended, that drew him into electoral politics, and eventually a run for the highest office.

Moon was born on Jan. 24, 1953, during the Korean War, on Geoje island off the southern tip of the peninsula. His parents had fled from the North during the war, sailing for three days on the deck of a U.S. ship packed with refugees.

“I was thinking I wanted to finish my life there in Hungnam doing pro-bono service,” he said in his book published in January, referring to his parents’ hometown on North Korea’s east coast.

“When peaceful reunification comes, the first thing I want to do is to take my 90-year-old mother and go to her hometown.”

“Nerdy style”

As a law student in the 1970s, he was jailed twice during pro-democracy protests against the dictatorship of Park Chung-hee – father of Park Geun-hye – and his successor, Chun Doo-hwan.

He was released from jail after passing a state bar exam.

As a conscript in South Korea’s special forces, Moon was part of mission that responded after North Korean troops murdered an American soldier with an axe in the demilitarised zone in 1976.

Moon joined Roh’s law practice in Busan city in 1982, defending democracy and labour activists during the rule of authoritarian military presidents.

“Moon had a distinctively nerdy style, reviewing papers after papers quietly as he prepared for court cases,” Seol Dong-il, who worked with Moon and Roh at the law firm, told Reuters.

“When workers sought advice from him, Moon used to sit down for hours to listen to them.”

Moon cut short his trek in the Himalayas in 2004 when he read news in Nepal that parliament had passed an impeachment motion against Roh for allegedly violating election campaign laws.

He returned to join a team of lawyers who successfully argued Roh’s case at the Constitutional Court, which overturned the motion.

Glass of Soju

Moon helped Roh open the inter-Korean Kaesong Industrial Park in 2004 and helped him prepare for a rare summit with then North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in 2007.

North Korea’s official media have not mentioned Moon by name but said it was time to deal the conservatives a crushing election defeat so the two Koreas could put a period of confrontation behind them.

“We should end the history of North-South confrontation that has been continued by the puppet conservative group, and we as the same race should gather our strength to open a new era of independent reunification,” the North’s official Rodong Sinmun newspaper said on Monday.

On the campaign trail during 2004 parliamentary elections, a “very shy” Moon cut a “ridiculously awkward” figure, recalled former politician Choi Nak-jeong.

Moon himself entered politics in 2012, winning a parliamentary seat in Busan, Roh’s old political base. Later that year, he ran for president, losing to Park by a slim margin.

Moon faulted Park Geun-hye for being walled off from the public, and has pledged to turn the Blue House into a “resting space for the people”. He says he will work instead out of a 19-storey government building in central Seoul.

“I will be a president that can share a glass of soju with the public after work,” he told reporters in April, referring to South Korea’s vodka-like liquor.

Moon, a Catholic, is married with a son and a daughter.

Following are some of Moon’s policy positions and promises he made during the campaign:

North Korea

Moon has outlined a more moderate approach to North Korea and aims to revive a “sunshine policy” of engagement, pledging to ease tension and work to denuclearise the Korean peninsula by reviving six-party talks – involving the two Koreas, China, the United States, Russia and Japan. He also aims to expand economic and social exchange between the two Koreas. Moon has said he would meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un if a summit could help ease tension.

Chaebol policy

Moon aims to reform the chaebols, the family-run conglomerates that dominate Asia’s fourth-biggest economy. He says the chaebols stifle smaller companies and are detrimental to the economy and has called for transparency and democratic management. But there are questions about how radical his reforms might be and how far he will go in addressing the demands of the chaebols’ critics, who urge sharply higher corporate taxes or even dismantling of the conglomerates. Moon has said he will restrict presidential pardons for chaebol founding members in jail, and force chaebol to relinquish control of financial firms to cut inappropriate funding from financial affiliates to other related businesses.

Foreign policy

Moon has pledged to strengthen diplomatic and economic cooperation with main allies and neighbours the United States, China, Japan and Russia.

At the same time, he has promised a “National Interest First” approach and wrote in a book published in January that South Korea should learn to “say no to America”.

Thaad/National defence

Moon said the new administration should make a final decision on the deployment of a U.S. anti-missile system known as Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD). Moon will also seek a summit with China to resolve a dispute over the system, which China sees as a threat to its security.

He has also vowed to enhance a self-reliant defence capability. Plans include the transfer of wartime operational control of the South Korean military from the United States during his presidency and the early deployment of a pre-emptive strike system “Kill Chain”, and a homegrown missile defence system called Korea Air and Missile Defense.

Fiscal policy

Moon said he will push immediately for a supplementary budget to create jobs. He has said the budget could rise by more than 10 trillion won ($8.80 billion) from a current 400.5 trillion won approved for this year. He said he would aim to boost investment in 10 key sectors.

Jobs

Moon says he expects to create, on average, more than 500,000 new jobs a year. He aims to create 810,000 jobs in the public sector during his five-year term, including 514,000 in service sectors across welfare agencies, schools and in police stations. Some temporary positions at public agencies will be turned into regular positions, to improve working conditions and job security.

Minimum wage

He has promised to increase the minimum wage to 10,000 won ($8.83) an hour by 2020, from 6,470 won. He has also called for a cut in working hours to about 1,800 a year, from an average of 2,113 hours as of 2015.

Welfare

Moon has pledged to raise the basic pension to 300,000 won ($265) a month from a maximum of 206,050 won, from the age of 65. The pension will be given out to 70 percent of the elderly classified as low-income. He also pledged to double a subsidy given to mothers in the first six months of maternity leave to up to 2 million won ($1,757) a month, from 1 million won.

Environment/energy

Moon has pledged to phase out coal and nuclear energy to address public concerns over air pollution and safety, and has set a target to increase the share of renewables to 20 percent of total power generation by 2030.

Presidential powers

Moon promised to relocate the presidential office to a government complex in central Seoul, in an overhaul of presidential powers. He argues that the seclusion of the presidential complex known as the Blue House prevents communication with the public. He says he will fully disclose his day-by-day schedule to ensure the public knows what their president is doing. ($1 = 1,135.7200 won)