Protesters shout slogans during a candlelight vigil in Seoul on Jan. 7, 2017, calling for impeached South Korean President Park Geun-hye to step down. (Ahn Young-Joon/AP)

South Korea’s Constitutional Court will deliver its decision Friday in the sensational impeachment case against President Park Geun-hye, who’s at the center of a bribery scandal that has shocked a country all too familiar with corruption.

If the court removes Park from office, she will make history again. Not only will she have been South Korea’s first female president, she will also become South Korea’s first president to be impeached.

But if the court reinstates her, it will generate a mass outpouring of anger from a public fed up with the corruption between the political and business elite, a system that is seen as holding ordinary people down.

The stakes could hardly be higher.

“This is the biggest political shock we’ve experienced since 1987,” said Kang Won-taek, a professor of political science at Seoul National University, referring to the huge uprising that brought democracy to South Korea. “This is a very symbolic moment for us.” Kang expects the court to force the president out of office.

South Korean President Park Geun-Hye bows during an address to the nation at the presidential Blue House in Seoul on Nov. 29, 2016. (Pool/Getty Images)

The court has been hearing evidence for 10 weeks on the case, considering whether to uphold the motion passed by the National Assembly in December — with an overwhelming majority — to impeach her.

Since then, more explosive allegations have emerged, with special prosecutors this week saying they recommend a total of 13 charges against the president, including abuse of power and receiving bribes.

South Korean prosecutors say president colluded in corruption scandal

The case revolves around Park and her lifelong friend, Choi Soon-sil, who held no official position but turned out to wield huge influence over the president, much more than her official advisers and ministers.

Choi is accused of extracting bribes from big business — Samsung alone is accused of giving her $37 million — in return for using her relationship with the president to ensure favorable treatment for the companies.

Samsung’s de facto head, Lee Jae-yong, went on trial Thursday on a range of charges including bribery, embezzlement and perjury, and Choi has been on trial for months. Both strongly deny any wrongdoing.

Park has also steadfastly denied any wrongdoing through the whole process, but special counsel investigating the case have paved the way for laying charges against her once she leaves office and loses her immunity from prosecution.

In a damning 101-page report released this week, the special counsel said the president colluded with Choi and recommended charges including abuse of power, coercing donations and sharing state secrets. Park refused to be questioned during the investigation and declined to appear before the court.

Here’s what’s involved in impeaching a president in South Korea

But even if she is removed from office, this won’t be the end of the saga that has seemed straight from the script of a melodramatic Korean soap opera. Protests are likely, and new elections must be held within 60 days.

“Expectations are that the court will uphold the impeachment, but how will the public respond?” said Scott Snyder, a Korea expert at the Council on Foreign relations. “Will there be violence? Who takes energy, intensity, and momentum from the decision into a political campaign? How polarizing will the campaign be?” Snyder asked.

Huge but peaceful demonstrations against Park — topping a million protesters, according to organizers — helped bring the issue to a head at the end of last year.

But after Park was suspended from office in December, large pro-Park demonstrations have also been taking place. Calling themselves “Parksamo” or “people who love Park,” a group of mainly older conservatives have set up camp in the central plaza in front of Seoul City Hall, flying a U.S. flag above their tents.

So, whatever the outcome on Friday, there will be a large group of unhappy Koreans taking to the streets to protest the decision.

The Constitutional Court has been racing against the clock to make its decision. The chief justice retired as scheduled in January, taking the number of judges on the bench down to eight, and the acting chief justice finishes her term on Monday, creating a deadline for their decision. The agreement of six judges is required for a ruling.

Samsung scion to be indicted on bribery charges]

Park, 65, is the daughter of former military strongman Park Chung-hee, who served as president from 1963 to 1979 and oversaw South Korea’s transformation from an agrarian backwater into an economic powerhouse, largely by providing generous government support for conglomerates such as Samsung and Hyundai. She lived in the presidential Blue House — where she has been holed up during this scandal — from age 11.

Park has long been considered a kind of princess figure in South Korea, and one with a traumatic past. While she was still at university, her mother was killed by a bullet meant for her father, shot by a North Korean sympathizer. Even today, Park wears an old-fashioned hairstyle reminiscent of her mother’s.

Her mother’s death meant Park effectively became South Korea’s first lady at the age of 22. During this time she became close to Choi Tae-min, the founder of a religious cult that incorporated elements of Christianity and Buddhism, who would “deliver messages” to Park from her dead mother, according to local reports. A U.S. Embassy cable noted that the local press described Choi as a “Korean Rasputin.”

Park also became close to Choi’s daughter, Choi Soon-sil, the confidante at the center of this scandal, and their friendship continued after both their fathers died.

Park’s father, still president, was killed in 1979 by his own spy chief, and she disappeared from public view for almost two decades. In the late 1990s, she became a lawmaker in the conservative party and was elected South Korea’s first female president in 2012.

Previous South Korean presidents have been embroiled in corruption scandals, usually involving their family members. The never-married Park campaigned on her inability to be corrupted, saying the fact that she had no children and was estranged from her siblings meant there was no one to bribe.

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