Congratulations to Choi Sang-mok!

Choi became South Korea’s third president in a month on Friday, when the National Assembly voted to impeach Han Duck-soo, whose tenure as caretaker lasted less than two weeks.

Han stepped in on December 14 for Yoon Suk Yeol, who was impeached on a second try following an ill-conceived attempt to (re)institute de facto military rule, an egregious gamble which shocked the international community and jeopardized four decades of successful democracy.

Yoon’s removal will only be final if and when the country’s nine-member Constitutional Court issues a formal decision, a process that could take as long as six months. For Yoon’s impeachment to stick, six of nine Constitutional Court justices need to vote in favor.

Currently, the court’s operating with three vacant seats, which means a single justice could overturn Yoon’s impeachment. In other words: Yoon, who conjured the ghost of yesteryear’s military dictatorships by sending some 300 heavily-armed martial law police to the legislature earlier this month as part of an effort to commandeer the media and ban political activity, could be reinstated if his party sways just one sitting justice.

On Thursday, Han said he wouldn’t approve three appointments to fill the court vacancies because — and try not to laugh — that authority resides with the president, which is to say with Yoon, who can’t approve the appointees because his powers are suspended pending the court decision.

Understandably furious at that flagrantly absurd exercise in question-begging, the opposition — which controls South Korea’s unicameral legislature — voted to oust Han, accusing him of leading an “insurrection.”

“The acting president has transformed into an ‘acting insurrection leader,'” Lee Jae-myung chided, charging (informally, for now) Han with aiding and abetting Yoon’s People Power Party which Lee said has “abandoned its duty to uphold the Constitution,” choosing instead to serve as Yoon’s “loyal guard.”

Han becomes the first acting (i.e., interim) leader to be impeached in South Korea, adding another dubious chapter to a fraught domestic political history which, beneath the veneer of peaceful, post-military rule democratic governance, was typified by scandal and recrimination. Lee promised Friday to “root out all the insurrection forces” in the government.

If Yoon’s impeachment is ultimately upheld by the court, the country would hold elections within 60 days, but six months (the allowable judicial deliberation period) plus 60 days seems like an eternity in the current melee.

If you’re wondering, Choi’s a technocrat. Specifically, he leads the finance ministry, and spent decades at the institution. Ahead of the move to impeach Han, he begged the opposition to refrain, citing economic and financial stability.

The won slipped to the weakest since 2009. “Our economy and people’s livelihoods, which are walking on thin ice in a national emergency, cannot bear the expansion of political uncertainty surrounding the acting authority,” Choi said.

Later, once the deed was done, Choi promised to “minimize confusion” and “stabilize” a nation in turmoil. (Good luck.)

Meanwhile, South Korean prosecutors indicted former Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun over his role in Yoon’s martial law fiasco.