Jasmine Lee: South Korea’s first Filipina lawmaker

MANILA, Philippines – Korean lawmaker Jasmine Lee, who spoke as a “Migrant Voice” at IOM’s 2014 Council, is a “Migrant Hero” who has overcome adversity and personal tragedy to become a powerful voice for migrants in South Korea – a nation struggling to come to terms with a small, but growing immigrant population.    

Born in the Philippines, Lee married South Korean mariner, Lee Dong-ho in 1996 and became a naturalized Korean citizen in 1998.

She learned the language, forged a career as a Korean TV star and became one of Seoul’s first foreign-born civil servants.

In 2012 she was elected to South Korea’s National Assembly as a member of the ruling Saenuri  party, becoming the first non-ethnic Korean to serve in the legislature. 

But her meteoric rise from Ateneo de Davao was also marred with tragedy. In 2010 her husband died of a heart attack while saving their daughter from drowning in a whirlpool in a mountain stream on a family vacation.

Advocating multiculturalism 

Lee subsequently threw herself into her work to become a leading advocate of multiculturalism in South Korea. The country was largely isolated from the outside world that exported migrant labour until its rapid economic expansion in the 1970s and 1980s.

The curiousity she attracted starting with her in-laws was awkward, but it was nothing compared to the stereotyping suffered by migrants in the country today. The total number of migrants in South Korea represent just 3% of the population and are not normally eligible for citizenship or even permanent residency, unless they are married to a South Korean.

“Before, they asked how I came here. Sometimes they didn’t even realize that their questions were discriminatory. Now they ask migrants why they came. People think that they (the migrants) have come to take something away,” she observes.

Koreans, who see themselves as a tight-knit homogeneous society, are now beginning to grapple with the challenges of multicultural integration.

Migrant influx

Growing numbers of the migrant workers from South, Southeast and East Asia are lured to take what is considered the “dirty, dangerous, and difficult” jobs associated with economic growth. They have found ways to stay on, but still face economic and social discrimination.

As Koreans migrated to the cities, many farmers also opted to marry foreign women from neighbouring East and Southeast Asian countries. Mixed marriages, often arranged by brokers, produced children referred to as “Kosians,” who challenged many Koreans’ sense of ethnic homogeneity.

Lee’s mission to end discrimination. This has led her to become a voice for migrant groups including foreign spouses in Korea, while her advocacy has won her supporters both inside the government and among many Koreans who believe in the country’s multicultural future. – Rappler.com 

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