CORRECTED-Samsung Lee asked to head Korea top biz lobby group

(Corrects to clarify Lee Myung-bak was not a former Samsung chief executive in paragraph 5)

SEOUL, July 15 (Reuters) - The Federation of Korean Industries (FKI), South Korea's most powerful business lobby, said it had asked Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) Chairman Lee Kun-hee to head the group.

If Lee, 68, accepts the appointment it would help in his efforts to rehabilitate his public image after a presidential pardon for tax evasion last year.

Some 15 chairmen of South Korea's biggest business groups met at Lee's home to lobby the Samsung chairman to take the position, an FKI spokesman said.

"Participants at a dinner meeting have suggested Lee become chairman but he made no comment on it," the spokesman said.

The billionaire businessman usually shuns public life but has been working hard to improve his image after being convicted of tax evasion in 2008. South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, himself a former chief executive, pardoned Lee in 2009.

Lee was reinstated as an International Olympic Committee member in February and vowed to help the South Korean city Pyeonchang win the 2018 Winter Olympics.

Lee also appeared at a Las Vegas electronics show earlier this year with his family, marking an abrupt change in his usual reclusive behaviour.

Samsung Group [SAGR.UL] accounts for about a fifth of South Korea's total exports. Its crown jewel, Samsung Electronics, overtook Hewlett-Packard (HPQ.N) last year as the world's largest technology company by revenue.

($1=1201.5 Won)

(Reporting by Miyoung Kim; Additional reporting by Cho Mee-young; editing by Brett Cole and Karen Foster)