REBOOTING SOUTH KOREA

PRESIDENT LEE JAE-MYUNG ON HIS PLAN TO KICK-START HIS NATION'S ECONOMYAND COURT DONALD TRUMP

- CHARLIE CAMPBELL

PRESIDENT LEE JAE-MYUNG IN SEOUL ON SEPT. 3

IT WAS NOT HOW LEE JAE-MYUNG ENVISIONED HIS FIRST DAY ON THE job. Following his election as South Korea's President on June 3, Lee's staff arrived at their new offices in central Seoul the next morning to find rooms strewn with trash and desks equipped with monitors but bereft of computers, which had all been piled in a corner. It was a struggle to get doors unlocked and find even basic stationery.

"It was a very busy and chaotic period," Lee, 61, tells TIME in his only Western media interview since taking office. "I thought that we had done much preparation in advance, but it was not sufficient."

LEE'S 1978 HIGH SCHOOL EQUIVALENCY EXAMINATION APPLICATION FORM PHOTO

Behind the chaos was his disgraced predecessor, Yoon Suk-yeol, whose December declaration of martial law plunged the East Asian nation of 50 million into six months of political paralysis that concluded with Yoon's impeachment—and, after a snap poll, Lee's election.

Just over 100 days on, the new leader has moved with such speed that the chaos he encountered on his first day seems like a distant memory. In Seoul, one of the world's most densely populated cities, he has imposed a 600 million won ($430,000) cap on mortgage loans for property purchases to quell an overheated housing market. A new labor law, meanwhile, has reduced legal liabilities for striking workers, and some $10 billion of cash vouchers ranging from $110 to $330 have been distributed to every citizen, depending on income, to boost local businesses.

"One of my biggest accomplishments is that South Korea's domestic political situation has been stabilized," he says.