Woo Sang-ho "Cannot find reason to exempt Park Ji-hyun from running for party leader"
On the 24th, eight days before the June 1 local elections, Park Ji-hyun, co-chair of the Democratic Party's Emergency Response Committee, held a press conference at the National Assembly Communication Office to make a final public appeal to rally support. Photo by Yoon Dong-joo doso7@
[Asia Economy Reporter Koo Chae-eun] The Democratic Party of Korea has decided not to put forward discussions regarding the application of the proviso clause in Article 6 of the party constitution (‘may be otherwise decided by resolution of the Party Affairs Committee’) related to former Emergency Response Committee Chair Park Ji-hyun’s candidacy for the party convention. This decision was made because no unavoidable reasons were found to apply the exception.
On the 4th, Woo Sang-ho, the Democratic Party’s Emergency Response Committee Chair, stated, “The Emergency Response Committee discussed the matter of Park Ji-hyun’s candidacy for the party convention today.” Woo said, “The committee members consider former Chair Park Ji-hyun a valuable talent of the Democratic Party, but they judged that no unavoidable reasons to recognize an exception were found,” adding, “Therefore, we decided not to submit the agenda for the exception clause for Park Ji-hyun’s candidacy to the Party Affairs Committee for discussion.”
Accordingly, former Emergency Response Committee Chair Park, who declared her candidacy for party leader on the 2nd, will not be able to participate in the party convention.
Woo Sang-ho, Emergency Response Committee Chairman of the Democratic Party of Korea, is attending the Emergency Response Committee meeting held at the National Assembly on the 27th and delivering an opening remark. Photo by Yoon Dong-joo doso7@
Former Emergency Response Committee Chair Park declared her candidacy for party leader on the 2nd, but controversy arose over her eligibility. The current Democratic Party regulations grant the right to hold party positions and public office candidacy only to ‘registered party members.’ The qualification of registered party member requires payment of party dues for six months. Park was recruited to the Democratic Party on January 27, during the presidential election, as the head of the Digital Sexual Crime Eradication Special Committee of the election campaign headquarters. She has been paying party dues since February, but will not meet the registered party member requirement by the candidate registration deadline on the 17th. However, Article 6 of the party constitution includes a proviso clause stating ‘may be otherwise decided by resolution of the Party Affairs Committee.’
Park countered this by saying, “It should be handled according to the proviso clause in the party regulations that states ‘may be otherwise decided by resolution of the Party Affairs Committee.’” She added, “In fact, according to this regulation, candidate Kim Dong-yeon participated in the gubernatorial primary in Gyeonggi Province after going through resolutions by the Emergency Response Committee and the Party Affairs Committee during the local elections.”
However, there were opinions that the case of Governor Kim Dong-yeon could not be applied to Park’s candidacy for party leader. Democratic Party lawmaker Kim Nam-guk appeared on a radio show that day and said, “In the case of Governor Kim, it was not an exception granted, but rather part of an agreement made in the context of the New Wave and party-to-party integration,” adding, “Since he fully enjoyed the rights as a party member from the New Wave, he was granted those rights in the unified Democratic Party as well.”
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.
