The official media of North Korea They reported this Wednesday the death of former head of regime propaganda, Kim Ki Nam to whom the cult of personality created around the Kim dynasty is attributed.
In images broadcast by official media, the current leader of the hermetic regime, Kim Jong Un, bows before the coffin of the “revolutionary veteran”, says the KCNA news agency.
According to this medium, Kim Ki Nam, hospitalized since 2022, died on Tuesday at the age of 94 due to his advanced age and “multiple organ dysfunction.”
He is especially known for having led for decades Pyongyang’s crucial propaganda department, from which he forged the still prevailing cult of the Kim dynasty.
North Korean state media describe him as “a veteran of our Party and the revolution, a prestigious theorist and a prominent political activist.”
In the late 2010s, the functions of Kim Ki Nam as Pyongyang’s chief propagandist were taken over by Kim Yo Jong, the current leader’s influential sister.
The Kim dynasty, established by communist leader Kim Il Sung, has ruled this impoverished and isolated nation with an iron fist for three generations.
For Ahn Chan-il, a defector turned researcher in charge of the World Institute for North Korean Studies, Kim Ki Nam “is the North Korean equivalent of Paul Joseph Goebbels,” Nazi Germany’s propaganda chief.
“The propaganda and agitation strategies of the Kim dynasty are all born from the mind of Kim Ki Nam,” this expert told AFP.