13 Facts About Ahn Hee-jung

Ahn Hee-jung served as the 36th and 37th Governor of South Chungcheong Province.

Ahn Hee-jung was born in Yeonmu County, Nonsan, South Chungcheong Province on 1 May 1965, as the third of five children.

Ahn Hee-jung dropped out of Namdaejeon High School in Daejeon due to his involvement in the Pyeongcheonha incident, in which he was caught reading Pyeongcheonha, an anti-regime newspaper published by Lee Chan-koo.

Ahn Hee-jung was active and organized the Korea University Patriotic Students Association, merging fourteen student clubs of Korea University.

However, Ahn Hee-jung did not join the move as he was against the three-party-merger in principle so instead he led the efforts to establish a new democratic party in 1990.

The eighteen members of the Reunification Democratic Party including Ahn Hee-jung chose to remain in the newly established democratic party.

Ahn Hee-jung was found guilty in an appeal court in September 2004 and was sentenced to one year in prison, serving his term at the Seoul Detention Center.

Ahn Hee-jung was concerned that his conviction might do harm to the President and declined any political titles during the participatory government to keep a distance.

Ahn Hee-jung won the governorship of South Chungcheong Province against Park Sang-don of the Liberty Forward Party by a margin of 2.4 percent in the fifth local election held on 2 June 2010.

Ahn Hee-jung was re-elected to the position of the 37th Governor of South Chungcheong in 2014, defeating Chung Jin-suk.

Ahn Hee-jung was considered the main darkhorse contender to be the Democratic Party of Korea's presidential nominee against frontrunner Moon Jae-in.

Ahn Hee-jung revealed there were other victims in the Governor's office.

Subsequently, Ahn Hee-jung resigned from his position as governor, admitting to the charges and apologizing to the victims of the assault.