Jeong Jae-ho

Jeong Jae-ho was born on 18 December 1930 in Daegu, then under Japanese rule. He attended Daegu Namsan High School and went on to study creative writing at Sorabol College of Arts in Seoul.

At 17 and 18 he published two collections of poems, Hyangsu (Nostalgia) and Pokposu (Waterfall). During the Korean War, when Daegu was a temporary capital, newspaper executives and literary figures stayed on the upper floor of his family's house. He helped them put manuscripts in order and run errands, and that experience led him into newspaper work.

Jeong began as a journalist at Sanup Sibo, Segye Tongsin and the Minguk Ilbo, then covered politics for the Seoul Shinmun. At the Kyunghyang Shinmun he became political editor and later deputy managing editor and a standing editorial writer.

In 1971 he was appointed chief of staff and spokesman to Baek Du-jin, Speaker of the National Assembly. In 1973 he entered the 9th National Assembly as a member of the Yushin Jeonguhoe, the group of legislators selected through the National Conference for Unification under the Yushin constitution of President Park Chung Hee. He was returned to the 10th National Assembly in 1979 and served the group as deputy floor leader, head of its public relations committee and, in 1979, spokesman.

After Park's assassination and the rise of the new military government, Jeong was among the politicians barred from political activity in 1980. The ban was lifted in 1984. He then chaired the Korea Management Information Center and worked for the Heonjeonghoe, the association of former members of the National Assembly, as policy director, chief editor of its monthly magazine Heonjeong and secretary general, later serving as vice-president and adviser. He was also chairman and editor of the Seoul Post and an editorial adviser to the Daegu Ilbo.

In 2017 he became chairman of the Minjok Junghung Hoe, which works to honour the memory of Park Chung Hee, and he led its memorial ceremonies and commemorative projects until his death.

Beyond his early poetry, Jeong published collections of columns, among them a volume inviting readers to the dawn of the new millennium and a book on the portrait of the president. He also translated The Ugly Japanese into Korean. Little else about his private life has been reported publicly.

Jeong Jae-ho died at about 1.30 pm on 30 October 2026, aged 95, according to the Minjok Junghung Hoe, as reported by the Yonhap News Agency. The cause of death was not made public. His funeral altar was set up at the funeral hall of the National Health Insurance Service Ilsan Hospital in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province, and the funeral procession took place early on 1 November 2026.

Jeong's career traced a path common to his generation of Korean political journalists, from the newsroom to the Speaker's office and into the National Assembly during the Yushin era. In his last decade he was one of the most visible keepers of Park Chung Hee's memory, leading the association that organises the annual memorial for the former president.