Rival rallies in Seoul over Park impeachment

SEOUL: Hundreds of thousands of South Koreans  held rival protests in Seoul on Saturday over  the impeachment of President Park Geun-Hye  on the fourth anniversary of her swearing into  office.  Park was impeached by parliament in December  over a corruption scandal that has  brought millions of people onto the streets in  mass protests.  Around 17,000 riot police were mobilised,  setting up barricades with their buses at the centre  of the capital to separate Park’s supporters  from those opposing her.  Anti-Park protestors, carrying yellow ballons  and waving banners, marched in three directions.  One column proceeded towards the presidential  Blue House as another group headed to  the Constitutional Court, which has to decide  whether to endorse or reject Park’s impeachment.  A third group passed by the headquarters of  powerful family-run business groups -- known as  chaebols -- including SK, Lotte and Hanwha.  The de-facto head of South Korea’s giant  Samsung Group Lee Jae-Yong was arrested last  week, a first among business tycoons engulfed  in the scandal surrounding the president and her  close friend Choi Soon-Sil.  "Arrest other tycoons," the protestors  chanted. The chaebols funnelledmillions of dollars  into two dubious foundations controlled by  Choi.  They all denied providing funds in return for  favours, but suggested they regularly came  under pressure from high-level political circles.  Park has seen her approval ratings plunge  from 67 percent to five percent as the country  was rocked by the high-profile scandal.  The Constitutional Court will on Monday  hold its final hearing on Park’s impeachment. It  is expected the verdict will be handed down before  March 13.  If the court upholds the impeachment, Park  will be removed from her post immediately and  a presidential election must be held within 60  days. Not too far from the anti-Park protest, the  president’s supporters, mostly senior citizens,  waved national flags and chanted slogans urging  the court to nullify the impeachment. Otherwise  it would face a "bloody" civil resistance, they  said.Anti-Park protest organisers claimed a one  million turnout and pro-Park supporters said  they had attracted three million.  Police stopped issuing their own estimates  and an AFP journalist on the scene put both  numbers around 100,000 each or less.—AFP