Syngman Rhee
On July 20, 1948, Rhee was elected president of the Republic of Korea in the South Korean presidential election, 1948 with 92.3% of the vote; the second candidate, Kim Gu, received 6.7% of the vote. On August 15, the Republic of Korea was formally established in South Korea and Rhee was inaugurated as the first President of the Republic of Korea. The next month, on September 9, the north also proclaimed statehood as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. Rhee himself had been an independence activist, and his relations with the "chinilpa" Korean elites who had collaborated with the Japanese were, in the words of the South Korean historian Kyung Moon Hwang, often "contentious," but in the end an understanding was reached in which, in exchange for their support, Rhee would not purge the elites. In particular, the Koreans who had served in the colonial-era National Police, whom the Americans had retained after August 1945, were promised by Rhee that their jobs would not be threatened by him. Upon independence in 1948, 53% of South Korean police officers were men who had served in the National Police during the Japanese occupation.
Supreme Council for National Reconstruction
The Supreme Council for National Reconstruction, initially named the Military Revolutionary Committee, was a military junta that oversaw the government of South Korea from May 16, 1961 until the inauguration of the Third Republic of South Korea in 1963. It was composed largely of military officers who were involved in or supportive of the May 16 coup which overthrew the Second Republic of South Korea. The council was chaired initially by Chang Do-yong, and subsequently by Park Chung-hee. The president of the Second Republic, Yun Po-sun, stayed in office as a figurehead.