The North Korean succession

Thanks Dad
Kim Jong Il may be preparing to hand his luckless country over to his luckless son.

NORTH KOREANS are by and large hungry, oppressed,
cloistered and treated as infants. But they have one
powerful stimulant to keep them going: the outsized cult of
hero worship surrounding their pot-bellied ruler, Kim Jong Il.
That is why outsiders will strain next week for a glimpse
into the hermit ef to see if Mr Kim uses the Korean Workers’
Party’s rst gathering in 30 years to designate his third son, Kim
Jong Un, as his heir. Whatever he does, the issue of succession
is likely to escape the secrecy in which it has been wrapped for
decades. For all the peephole excitement of watching a reallife
Dynasty in one of the world’s darkest places, the transition
could produce some dangerous moments��and not just
on the peninsula, but also for China, North Korea’s sole remaining
protector.
The older Kim, who has been in power since 1994, may be
frail, but it is not clear that he is yet ready to anoint his twentysomething,
basketball-loving boy, even though he has been
called a chip o the old block. Unlike the father, who was
groomed as dictator-in-waiting for over a decade, his third
son’s existence is still o cially unacknowledged. Reportedly
there is a trite song, called Footsteps , in his honour, and a
glowing published tribute to his excellence both in the arts of
pen and sword . But his quali cations for running a derelict
country with a nuclear arsenal and one of the world’s ve biggest
armies are seriously in doubt.

It is thus possible that the conference may pass with barely
a word about succession. Yet even in a country as batty as
North Korea, it would be odd to throw a lavish get-together of
the main party hacks for no reason. Even if it is a charade of a
ballot, it is probably sensible to assume that the stated purpose
of electing (read rubber stamping) a supreme leadership
body is important, and that some sort of profound, if hesitant,
handover of power is under way