The 21st National Assembly has poor attendance records

Jun 07, 2021, 09:14 pm

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Many seats are empty as the main opposition People Power Party’s (PPP) lawmakers left the National Assembly demanding an apology for the remarks made by Vice Speaker Kim Sang-hee on April 20, 2021./ Photographed by Lee Byung-hwa

AsiaToday reporter Jeong Geum-min

The 21st National Assembly has celebrated its 1st anniversary of inauguration, and it was a bad year for attendance at the assembly, which stressed the importance of attendance. Some lawmakers, including lawmaker Lee Sang-jik and Kim Tae-ho, posted more than a 30 percent absence rate, indicating that they missed 3 out of 10 general meetings.

AsiaToday on Sunday analyzed the attendance records of the 21st National Assembly members recorded in the ‘Open National Assembly’ by the Parliamentary monitoring center under the People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy. It found that 36.37% of lawmakers posted more than 10 percent unauthorized absence rate since the launch of the 21st National Assembly.

Unauthorized absences refer to absences except for cases where a petition is submitted to obtain permission from the Speaker of the National Assembly in accordance with Article 32 Clause 2 of the National Assembly Act, or where a report is submitted due to a legitimate reason such as a business trip. The survey excluded Kim Jin-ae, a former member of the Open Democratic Party who was retired at the National Assembly plenary session on March 24.

Earlier, the ruling Democratic Party (DP) proposed an annual allowance cut for lawmakers who do not attend plenary session, as a pledge for the April 15 general election. The main idea of the proposal was to reduce an annual allowance by 10% for those with absence rate of 10-20 percent. If this is applied as it is to the plenary session of the 21st National Assembly, one in three lawmakers will be subject to allowance cuts.

By parties, the main opposition People Power Party (PPP), which staged outside struggles, had the highest absence rate with 101 lawmakers, followed by 5 non-party lawmakers and the ruling Democratic Party with 2 lawmakers.

Both PPP lawmaker Kim Tae-ho and independent lawmaker Lee Sang-jik posted the lowest attendance rate. The two of them were absent in 14 out of 46 plenary sessions, recording 30.43 percent of absence rate. They posted a 69.6 percent attendance rate.

“I should reflect on it as attendance can be seen as one of the major duties of a member of the National Assembly,” said Kim in a phone interview with AsiaToday. “At the same time, however, my absence was an expression of implied resistance against the ruling party’s monopoly and damage to procedural democracy,” he added.

In the case of lawmaker Lee, being in the middle of a trial on charges of damaging Eastar Jet by selling the company stocks to an affiliate at a low price seems to have contributed to his high absence rate.

Following them, PPP lawmaker Hong Moon-pyo and independent lawmaker Song Eon-suk missed 13 of the 46 plenary sessions without notice, recording an absence rate of 28.26 percent. Other lawmakers with high absence rate include independent lawmaker Hong Joon-pyo with 23.91 percent and PPP lawmaker Hong Seok-joon with 21.74 percent.

Only 158 lawmakers have never been absent from the plenary session.

#The 21st National Assembly #attendance records