SEOUL | The high court of Seoul rules on Monday in the new corruption trial of the heir of Samsung, with the key to a possible sentence of several years of detention which would deprive the South Korean giant of its main decision maker.
• Read also: 20-year prison sentence against ex-President Park confirmed
• Read also: Former President Lee definitively sentenced to 17 years in prison
Officially, Lee Jae-yong is vice president of Samsung Electronics, the world’s leading manufacturer of smart phones and memory chips. But in fact, he is the one who has taken up the torch at the head of the conglomerate since his father Lee Kun-hee, the architect of the group’s global take-off, stepped back due to health problems. The patriarch finally passed away in October.
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Samsung is by far the largest of the “chaebols”, those family industrial empires that dominate the 12e Mondial economy. Its overall turnover represents one fifth of South Korea’s GDP, and is therefore crucial to the country’s economic health.
But Mr. Lee was sentenced in 2017 to five years in prison for corruption, embezzlement and other offenses related to the resounding corruption scandal that led to the impeachment of South Korean President Park Geun-hye (2013-2017 ), then his incarceration.
On appeal, most of the corruption charges were dismissed and Mr. Lee received a suspended prison sentence. But the Supreme Court then ordered a new trial.
The case involves millions of dollars the group had paid to the president’s shadow confidante, Choi Soon-sil. Bribes that were, according to the prosecution, intended to facilitate the transfer of power to the head of the conglomerate, while Lee Kun-hee was bedridden after a heart attack in 2014.
The Supreme Court confirmed Thursday the sentence of former President Park to 20 years in prison.
This scandal had once again underlined the troubled connections between the South Korean power and the great families who control the “chaebols”, these conglomerates at the origin of the prodigious recovery of the country after the Korean War.
In May 2020, the heir offered a rare apology to the media, especially for the controversial succession process that allowed him to take the lead of the group founded by his grandfather Lee Byung-chull.
Lee Jae-yong even promised that he would be the last in the family line of succession, and that his children would not inherit it.
His father and grandfather were also in trouble with the law, but neither served a prison sentence.
For its part, Samsung Electronics announced ten days ago that it expected a 25% jump in operating profit in the fourth quarter, boosted by the very strong demand for chips induced by the boom in teleworking in the context of of the pandemic.
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