Spirit of Devoted Service for People: DPRK

Ideal and Perfect Political Identity

The collapse of socialism, a great political earthquake, which started in the late 1980s ended with the red flag pulling down at Kremlin, Moscow, in December 1991. The continuous collapse of socialism in the USSR and other eastern European countries made people expect the “end of socialism” in the whole world, reminding them of the so-called domino effect which the US had been advocating.

Amid this turmoil, a rumour that it was not long before the DPRK would also give up socialism and collapse spread in the international community.

However, socialist Korea remains unperturbed till now when 30 years have passed since then and it is growing stronger day by day at that.

It is a mystery of history.

What, then, has enabled the small country to defend socialism and advance forward towards the status of a socialist power without enjoying any support from a wing or rear while having to suffer from worst-ever trials due to the blockade and military blackmail by the allied imperialist forces against it?

The answer can be found in the military parade which was held in Kim Il Sung Square in its capital city of Pyongyang in October 2020 to celebrate the 75^th anniversary of the founding of the Workers’ Party of Korea.

The congratulatory speech of Kim Jong Un, President of the State Affairs, full of warm affection for his people, and the looks of those attending the parade listening to the speech in tears—all these provided the international society with an occasion to recognize the DPRK’s political identity once again.

The DPRK is a country which has formed an integral whole between the leader and the people. It can be confidently said that there is no such a country as the DPRK in the world.

Vishwanath, a renowned social figure of India, once said that the unshakable unity and might of the DPRK is characterized by the organic unity of the leader, the Party and the masses which constitutes the main structure of its society.

The reason why the social structure of the DPRK is so strong lies in the unique cohesion of the components of the main structure of its society.

The materials existing in nature are different in solidity according to their structural coupling scheme even though they have the same structural elements. For example, diamond and graphite are the same in principal ingredients, but the former is incomparably harder than the latter. This means that the characteristics of a material depend on the coupling scheme of the core and molecules which form the material.

When the main structure of the Korean society as hard as diamond is the organic unity of the leader, the Party and the people, its coupling scheme is based on the leader’s affection for and trust in the people and sense of obligation and loyalty of the people to live up to them. This coupling scheme has produced the phenomenal single-hearted unity of the DPRK.

There is a famous philosophical saying in the DPRK: “The people are my God.” This was the motto of President Kim Il Sung and Chairman Kim Jong Il and is now the motto of Kim Jong Un.

The affection for the people is the basis of the ideology and idea of Kim Jong Un and the main political principle and ethic which run through all realms—political, military, economic and cultural.

He set forth the slogan “Everything for the people, everything by relying on them!” and led the WPK to formulate all its lines and policies with the people at the centre. And he himself does his best for the people, always mixing with them. He visits different places in the country continuously, rain or snow, saying that he must visit any place where people live. The ardent love and devoted service of the leader have begotten the people’s absolute trust in and respect for and boundless loyalty to him.

Herein lies the fundamental key to the DPRK having created the firm unity and cohesion of the leader, the Party and the people.

The strength of nuclear weapons can be calculated, but it is impossible to estimate the strength of a nation and a collective which are united single-heartedly.

Appellation Unique to the Workers’ Party of Korea

The first word everyone learns at the start of his or her life is mother.

The people in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea call the Workers’ Party of Korea motherly party. Why do they do that?

It is the motto of the WPK that for it the people are the most valuable, their interest is the most sacred and its existence is solely for their good. 

From the earliest days of its founding (October 10, 1945), the WPK, regarding it as its mission to take full responsibility for the destiny of the people, has served them for over 70 years.

That is the reason why the people call the WPK motherly party.

Recently, the Korean people have suffered a series of natural disasters like typhoon and flooding. Many people lost their houses. 

But they did not lose heart or feel hopeless because they were well aware that the WPK would take care of them as it had done before.

Actually the WPK went closer to them to relieve them of sufferings just like a mother would not turn away from the misfortune of her children.

The WPK saw to it that all the country’s resources—human, material and technical—were mobilized for and focused on the building of new houses for the victims.

While the houses were under construction, the offices of county Party committees were offered to the victims and the officials worked in makeshift tents.

True to the will of the WPK that there is no issue more pressing than removing the pain of the people and more important than relieving them of misfortune, the builders erected new houses for the victims in a short time. Thus the victims could move to the new houses which were far better than their previous ones and fully furnished.  

This fact alone is sufficient to show why the Korean people call the WPK motherly party.

Kim Jong Un, General Secretary of the WPK, once said: Whether in times of happiness or of difficulty, our people invariably follow our Party, calling it motherly party; the motherly party are not words coined by a thinker, a politician or a leader of the working class but an honorary title and appellation our people gave to the WPK; our Party must, at all costs, prove itself worthy of the great trust of the people who unreservedly address it as “mother” and, to this end, it must become a genuine “servant” party for the people.

He regards becoming a servant for the people not as any duty, responsibility or obligation, but as the requirement of his life and the most worthwhile and happy right.

Many political parties existed in the history of mankind but none of them have been called motherly party and become a servant party.

True to his pledge that he would respect the people and remain faithful to the revolution at any time and at any place even though he were to be torn to pieces, Kim Jong Un devotes himself to the good of the people day and night.

With a view to supplying a sufficient amount of fish to orphans, he visited a windy port on the east coast and initiated the establishment of a fishery station solely dedicated to this end. And he took the responsibility for the work of baby homes, orphanages and old people’s rest homes across the country.

On a stormy day he looked round the streets of the capital city out of his concern for the citizens. When a region of the country was severely hit by flooding and typhoon, he, saying that the victims who had lost their homes were eagerly waiting for him outdoors, continued a risky trip along muddy roads and dangerous sodden railway embankments which might collapse any moment after the flood.

Yangdok Hot Spring Resort, a comprehensive spa therapy base and a multi-functional sports and cultural centre built in the central part of the DPRK, is also permeated with Kim Jong Un’s benevolence.

Always paying close attention to developing the rich spa resources of the country, he travelled to the Yangdok area and looked round the area, crossing rugged mountains and acquainting himself in detail with the amount of water gushing from the spa and its surrounding environment.

Then he proposed developing this area into a modern spa resort and guided the entire process of its construction. He examined more than 2 000 designs for it. And one day just before its inauguration he visited it and personally took the cable car to the top of the ski route, saying that he thought that his ride was better than ten times of test run and the people would feel safe if they were told that he himself had taken the cable car.

The city of Samjiyon in the northern part of the DPRK is also associated with the devotion of Kim Jong Un to the people.

In order to build it into a model of a mountain town Kim Jong Un visited construction sites several times in spite of midsummer heat and intensive cold of midwinter and meticulously led the entire process of the project.

It was reported that he examined about 8 800 detail designs for the city.

The project for building 10 000 flats which would transform the area of Songsin and Songhwa in Pyongyang in a year’s time in 2021 was not an easy decision to make.

It was a very difficult project several times bigger than the construction of Ryomyong Street in Pyongyang which had attracted the attention of the world several years before. Moreover it was executed when the border was sealed owing to the worldwide public health crisis. 

However, the difficult condition could not daunt Kim Jong Un. Regarding the project not as a work for economic profit, but as an ennobling undertaking for making all the wealth of the state and the result of the creative labour of the working people serve the people themselves, he personally participated in the ground breaking ceremony for the project and energetically led the entire process of the construction.

See what I do to serve the people, and you will know what my idea is—this is his innermost feeling.

True to his lofty intention and spirit of devoted service for the people that it should be the servant of the people, the WPK is continuing its sacred march to prove itself worthy of its appellation, motherly party.  

People Are Masters of Everything

A few years ago, a video edited by a TV reporter of a Western country after visiting the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea drew people’s attention. The video showed the Korean people enjoying modern civilization at such bases of cultural and leisure activities as the Munsu Water Park, the Rungna People’s Recreation Park, the People’s Open-Air Ice Rink and the May Day Stadium, and trams and trolley buses running along the streets.

The people who saw it said: I didn’t know that Pyongyang is such a beautiful city; I want to visit Pyongyang someday.

Singaporean media reported:

The DPRK has reached a high level of urban development. The streets are full of life. Mirae Scientists Street and Ryomyong Street, which are formed with modern skyscrapers, demonstrate both the mettle and aesthetic beauty of the times–posh, dignified and weighty.

What is more noteworthy in the country is not the developing urban areas, but the fact that masters of those things are the working people.

In fact, the country provides the working people free of charge with such houses, dream houses for the Westerners.

Also needed here is to see the impressions of foreigners from the Songdowon International Children’s Camp on the eastern coast of the country.

In brief, the impressions are that first, it provides modern facilities to young campers free of charge; second, sons and daughters of the working people and even orphans go to such a wonderful camp, where in other countries only children of millionaires and other privileged persons go; third, these are all application and fruition of the consistent and unshakable policy of the Workers’ Party of Korea and the government.

Upholding the slogan “Everything for the people, everything by relying on them!” the Party and the government see to it that all officials make selfless, devoted efforts for the good of the people.

The policy speech Kim Jong Un delivered at the Fifth Session of the 14^th Supreme People’s Assembly of the DPRK, held in September 2021, testifies to this.

Saying that the Party and government will be infinitely loyal to the great people and will display to the full their heavy mission and responsibility with their greatest efforts, Kim Jong Un called on them to work vigorously for the prosperity and development of the great country, the DPRK, for the happiness and security of the great people, and the new development of socialist construction of the country’s own style, upholding the slogans of “The people are God,” single-hearted unity and self-reliance.

As Kim Jong Un, who devotes his all for the people, administers people-first politics, the DPRK will develop into a country where the people enjoy all the benefits as masters of everything.