Luxury for pets Shallow pool at South Korea s presidential residence raises questions

A liberal lawmaker’s revelation of a shallow pool inside the presidential residence in Yongsan-gu, Seoul, has raised speculation that disgraced former president Yoon Suk Yeol may have constructed a swimming pool for the first couple’s pets when he moved in.

This aligns with ongoing suspicion by the liberal Democratic Party of Korea, which became the country’s ruling party with President Lee Jae-myung’s election win, about the excessive water use inside the official residence.

Representative Kim Byoung-joo said at the party’s supreme council meeting on June 9 that the speculation that the pool was used for pets, not humans, is gaining ground.

“I’ve looked around the space inside the official residence of the president, and a pool grabbed my attention,” said Mr Kim, who was one of the ruling party lawmakers invited to visit the official residence on June 7.

“We should closely examine whether the Yoons installed facilities for personal use with taxpayers’ money after moving into the official residence, where no one can monitor how the money is being spent,” the two-term lawmaker also said, adding that Yoon and his wife are suspected of having installed a cat tower worth 5 million won (S$4,750).

Before President Lee and his wife Kim Hye-kyung took over the space as their official residence, Yoon and his wife Kim Keon Hee were the first South Korean presidential couple to have chosen to use a building in the Seoul neighbourhood of Hannam-dong, Yongsan-gu, formerly a residence for the foreign minister, as the presidential residence.

The Yoon couple kept six dogs and five cats there until a week after Yoon was removed from office by the Constitutional Court in April amid the political crisis caused by his attempted self-coup.

The pool – estimated to be 5m long and 2m wide, with a shallow end about