Saenuri Party candidate Park Geun-hye is well-known for being picky in choosing her people. Efficiency comes before personal history. Devotion and principle are said to be priority considerations.

She keeps her aides close but not too close, giving her the image of being “uncommunicative.”

“Her style of making personnel decisions is shown through the uncommunicativeness between Park and her various committees, not to mention the lack of communication amongst the committees,” said politics professor Yun Seong-yi of Kyung Hee University.

Her aides are, for their part, criticized for displaying their absolute loyalty to her, rather than challenging her and giving different opinions.

A member of her campaign committee once expressed exasperation for not being able to get through to her during the heightened controversy over her historical views.

It took weeks of heavy attack by the opponents and careful and arduous persuasion by the campaign members for Park to offer an apology in September for her father former President Park Chung-hee’s iron-fisted rule. Park Chung-hee was assassinated on Oct. 26, 1979 by his intelligence chief, putting an end to his 18-year-long junta.

While past presidents shared brotherhood with their closest aides ― like President Roh Moo-hyun and his right-hand men Lee Gwang-hae and Ahn Dae-hee ― Park distances herself from making such personal connections. Some party officials say it is the best method of prevention of irregularities involving close confidantes of a leader.

“Because she keeps a certain barrier between her and her aides, it prevents the emergence of those abusing influence,” a party source explained.

The presidential candidate does have a relatively small yet airtight inner circle: the four assistants that have assisted her throughout her political career since 1998. Lee Jae-man, Lee Choon-sang, Jeong Ho-seong, and Ahn Bong-geun are said to enjoy Park’s uncontested trust.

Generally, Park tends to lean toward politicians with economic expertise, which is said to show her partiality for “reasonable thinking.”

Once she is persuaded by one’s capacity, Park does not shy away from calling them back regardless of any past fissures. They include Kim Moo-sung, head of the General Elections Measures Headquarters, and Yoo Seung-min, co-chair of the Central Election Commission, both of whom joined the campaign after fallouts with the former chairwoman.

By Lee Joo-hee (jhl@heraldcorp.com)