Jo Hae-jin: "'Expansion of the Number of Lawmakers' Is Not a Final Decision... Just an Example for Discussion"

"No Expansion of Assembly Seats Without Public Consent"

Cho Hae-jin, a member of the People Power Party and co-chair of the National Assembly's Special Committee on Political Reform (Jeonggae Special Committee), pointed out that the election system reform plan, which includes expanding the number of lawmakers, is merely a draft for discussion on the 27th and has not been finalized.

On the 21st, Cho said on SBS's "Kim Tae-hyun's Political Show," "The proposal in the Jeonggae Special Committee subcommittee is not for the two parties to negotiate and decide the system, but for all 300 members of the National Assembly to gather at the plenary committee on the 27th to have an open debate and free discussion to confirm consensus."

People Power Party lawmaker Cho Hae-jin is discussing election system reform issues in his office at the National Assembly Members' Office Building. Photo by Heo Young-han younghan@

Earlier, on the 17th, the Jeonggae Special Committee held a subcommittee meeting and approved three election system reform proposals to be submitted to the plenary committee. Cho, as the subcommittee co-chair, presided over the approval. Among the three proposals, Plan 1 and Plan 2 maintain the current single-member district system but increase the number of lawmakers to 350, which sparked controversy. The People Power Party raised strong objections at the party level, stating that the number of lawmakers cannot be increased.

However, Cho explained that the three proposals passed in the Jeonggae Special Committee subcommittee are not negotiation agreements but merely examples for discussion among lawmakers. He said, "We need to outline which system is better or more reformative through discussion," adding, "For that discussion, we asked the two parties to submit about two effective example proposals useful for debate, but currently, neither party has an official stance."

He continued, "Since two example proposals need to be submitted as discussion materials, the lawmakers from both parties in our subcommittee said, 'In the absence of official party positions, there are three advisory committee proposals created by experts convened by the Speaker's advisory committee. Let's submit those as discussion materials,' so we submitted them."

This has been misunderstood or misrepresented as a bipartisan agreement to increase the number of lawmakers. Cho emphasized, "Even among the proposals put forward by lawmakers from both parties in our Jeonggae Special Committee, there are about 10 or 20 different proposals when considering various clauses," highlighting that other proposals can be sufficiently discussed.

Regarding whether the expansion of the number of lawmakers will be realized, he said, "It will be difficult unless the public agrees. Of course, among the election law reform proposals submitted to our Jeonggae Special Committee, several Democratic Party lawmakers have proposed increasing the number of lawmakers, whereas the People Power Party has no official party stance, but the general trend has been to keep the number at 300 or, in some cases, prepare proposals to reduce it to 270."