Ruling party’s landslide victory expected to accelerate judicial reform

Apr 21, 2020, 07:58 am

By AsiaToday reporter Heo Gyeong-joon

The ruling Democratic Party’s (DP) landslide victory in the 21st general election is expected to accelerate President Moon Jae-in’s judicial reform drive.

In particular, the DP announced intensive judicial reforms centered on dissolving the ‘almighty chief justice oriented system’ and abolishing the National Court Administration (NCA).

According to the parliamentary and judicial circles on Monday, the DP plans to abolish the NCA, which oversees the judicial administration and supervise personnel affairs and budget related to the courts, while pushing to establish new offices of the court and the Supreme Court.

The DP also plans to abolish the Judicial Personnel Committee and establish a new judicial administrative council to oversee court administration affairs.

The new council will be composed of 11 members, including the chief justice and 6 outside experts to reflect various opinions.

“The 21st National Assembly will focus on reforming what has not been achieved in the 20th Assembly,” said Baek Hye-ryun of the ruling party. “The main task of judicial reform will be abolishing the NCA.”

“While the 20th Assembly focused its efforts on prosecution reform, the 21st Assembly will pay more attention to judicial reform,” she said.

Besides, former judges Choi Ki-sang, Lee Su-jin and Lee Tan-hee of the ruling DP have been elected, which would gather momentum for judicial reform.

They believe a stricter level of reform is needed as the judiciary’s evils have been revealed with the NCA’s involvement in a series of alleged misdeeds under former top Justice Yang Sung-tae including interventions in trials, illicit lobbying and surveillances of dissenting judges.

The judiciary is also preparing to reform itself by trying to organize the NCA with non-judges and more. The NCA has already submitted a proposal to the National Assembly for amendments to the Court Organization Law, but it hasn’t been properly discussed in the 20th Assembly.

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