Kim Jae-won: "Lee Jun-seok brought a draft including a 25% reduction for former party leavers"

Denies Leading Point Deduction Rule Targeting Hong Jun-pyo
Lee Jun-seok States "I Opposed It," Conflicting Views

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jun-yi] Kim Jae-won, Supreme Council Member of the People Power Party, claimed that Lee Jun-seok, the party leader, proposed a draft with higher penalty points for current lawmakers and others regarding the local election nomination penalty regulations. Previously, Lee had stated that he opposed the establishment of such regulations.

On the 23rd, Kim said on TBS Radio's 'Kim Eo-jun's News Factory,' "The draft brought by the party leader is about thirteen pages long," adding, "It included a 25% deduction for those with a history of leaving the party, a 25% deduction for those with disciplinary records, and a 15% deduction for those who received disciplinary actions such as suspension of party membership."

He continued, "Submitting the draft nomination management regulations to the Supreme Council is the leader's authority, and the leader convened the meeting to discuss this, which included these contents," and explained, "Among these, there were various controversies, and since having 25% and 15% deductions was complicated, I suggested unifying it to just 15%."

Earlier, on the 21st, the Supreme Council held a meeting and decided to apply a 15% deduction for those who ran as independents within the last five years in local election nominations, and a 10% deduction for current lawmakers.

Regarding this, the leader said on MBC Radio the previous day, "Personally, I opposed both of these," and added, "Coincidentally, People Power Party lawmaker Hong Joon-pyo falls under both categories, so the deductions were combined to a total of 25%."

On the same day, Kim denied allegations that the establishment of the rule was led to check Hong, saying, "It is true that lawmaker Hong falls under the criteria, but there are thousands of people nationwide applying for nominations now."