Rival parties fail to reach agreement on new legislative leadership

Jul 04, 2022, 09:30 am

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Amid a prolonged parliamentary gridlock, the door of the main assembly hall at the National Assembly is seen closed. / Source: Yonhap

AsiaToday reporter Kim Na-ri

Rival parties failed Sunday to reach agreement on forming the new leadership of the legislative branch. The main opposition Democratic Party (DP) said they would convene an extraordinary session of the National Assembly. If the main opposition party holds a plenary session on Monday to unilaterally elect a new National Assembly speaker, the political situation is expected to worsen.

Ruling People Party (PPP) Floor Leader Kweon Seong-dong and his counterpart Rep. Park Hong-keun of the DP failed to strike a deal in their last-minute negotiations for forming the new legislative leadership.

“I met Hong for about two hours from 3 p.m., and we shared the opinions of both parties, but failed to reach an agreement on forming a new legislative leadership,” Kweon told reporters after the meeting. “We parted ways after talking about resuming negotiations moving orward.”

The DP offered earlier to let the PPP take the chair seat of the Legislation and Judiciary Committee if the ruling PPP agreed to take part in the special committee for prosecution reform and retract a competence dispute request it filed with the Constitutional Court.

The PPP maintained its stance that it was difficult to accept the DP’s demand for the formation of judicial reformation special committee and withdrawal of the complaint at the Constitutional Court. “The DP’s request has nothing to do with forming the new legislative leadership,” said PPP spokesperson Yang Geum-hee in a commentary. “If the prosecution reform law is just, there is no reason to avoid constitutional court judgment. If the DP looks at the majority of the people and negotiates with reasonable common sense, the National Assembly will be normalized immediately,” the spokesperson said.

The PPP insisted the chair seat for the Legislation and Judiciary Committee should come without any conditions, saying that the DP had promised to give the chair post last year in an agreement reached between the floor leaders of both parties in July last year. According to the agreement, the DP takes the chair post for the Legislation and Judiciary Committee in the first half of the 21st National Assembly and hand it over to the PPP in the second half of the National Assembly.”

While the rival parties continue to be at odds, the DP warned that it would elect a new National Assembly speaker at a plenary session scheduled Monday. DP’s interim leader Rep. Woo Sang-ho said that a National Assembly speaker would be elected on Monday. “Since we have 170 seats, a National Assembly speaker is highly likely to be the one recommended by the DP at any time in the election,” Woo said. “Other standing committee posts need agreement. We have no plan to conduct every meeting unilaterally just because a chairperson is elected,” he said, indicating that his party would not unilaterally deal with the formation of the new legislative leadership.

Last month, the DP had submitted a request, with the names of 170 members of the National Assembly on it, to call an extraordinary session of the National Assembly to form parliamentary committees.

In 2020, the DP had elected Park Byeong-seug as National Assembly Speaker of the 21st National Assembly after failing to reach an agreement on forming parliamentary committees with the United Future Party, currently known as the People Power Party.

#DP #PPP #national assembly speaker #agreement #legislative leadership