President Roh Moo-hyun carried out a partial Cabinet reshuffle on Monday, appointing his chief national policy secretary Kwon O-kyu as new minister of finance and economy, Roh's office Cheong Wa Dae said.
The 54-year-old Kwon, who has worked out key policy road maps for the Roh government after serving in key posts of the Finance Ministry, will succeed Han Duck-soo, who offered to resign last week.
The president also appointed Kim Byong-joon, who left Cheong Wa Dae in late May after serving as chief presidential secretary for national policy, as new education minister, said the office.
The 52-year-old Kim, one of the president's most trusted policy advisors, will succeed Kim Jin-pyo, who offered to step down last week over a series of policy failures and a massive outbreak of food poisoning at local schools, Cheong Wa Dae said.
Minister of Planning and Budget Byeon Yang-kyoon was named to Kwon's post, while Chang Byoung-wan, vice minister of planning and budget, was picked as Byeon's successor, it said.
Meanwhile, the president appointed Jun Gun-pyo, deputy commissioner of the National Tax Service (NTS), as the new NTS commissioner. Jun will succeed Lee Ju-sung, who abruptly resigned last Tuesday from the top post without giving a clear explanation.
The new Cabinet appointees and new NTS chief are obliged to undergo a confirmation hearing in the National Assembly before formally assuming their posts by the end of this month.
Parliamentary approval is not mandatory. The three incumbent ministers will remain in office until the hearings for their replacements are completed.
Kwon, who also served as special envoy to the International Monetary Fund and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, is expected to push ahead with growth-oriented policies and continue efforts for the further opening of the country's markets, observers said.
"Kwon is credited with outstanding knowledge and various experience in economic policy, international economics and social policies," said Park Nam-choon, senior presidential secretary for personnel affairs.
Kim Byong-joon joined Roh's presidential campaign in 2002 and has worked as a policy advisor to President Roh since the president's inauguration in February 2003, devising key policy road maps for the administration. In March, Roh seriously considered naming Kim as prime minister, though the president finally chose Uri Party lawmaker Han Myeong-sook for the post.
Kim is expected to undergo a turbulent parliamentary confirmation hearing, with opposition parties and even some members of the ruling Uri Party associating him with what they consider the Roh administration's policy failure in the real estate field.
In this regard, secretary Park said it is too soon to determine that the real estate policies mapped out by Kim have failed.
"The government's real estate policies engineered by Kim Byong-joon are still in the early stage of implementation.
Positive effects from his real estate policies will soon be visible," he said.
Park said new Planning and Budget Minister Chang is credited with establishing a five-year national fiscal management plan during his days as an assistant planning and budget minister and has contributed to the successful reform of the government's budget and accounting systems.
As expected, the opposition parties strongly denounced President Roh for disregarding public opinion and the individual capabilities of the minister appointees in his latest Cabinet shakeup.
The main opposition Grand National Party (GNP) said it will thoroughly examine the qualifications of Kwon and Kim, in particular, in the upcoming confirmation hearing.
"We regret that President Roh failed to learn a lesson from the crushing defeat in the May 31 local elections and named unverified figures accused of policy failures to key Cabinet posts," Rep. Ahn Kyung-yul of the GNP said.
Rep. Lim Hae-kue of the GNP also said Kim Byong-joon is lacking in expertise in education and is partially responsible for education policy failures and confusions, while GNP deputy spokesman Lee Jung-hyun accused the president of moving to ruin the educational administration through his appointment of Kim as education minister.
The minor opposition Democratic Party said that President Roh's latest Cabinet shakeup is a failure due to his failure to reflect public opinion.
Local teachers' organizations also expressed strong opposition to the new education minister appointee.
"We expected a new education minister well armed with expertise in education and understanding of the elementary and secondary education, but the president totally ignored the opinion of the educational sector," the Korean Federation of Teachers' Associations said in a statement.
"The education minister appointee Kim devised a number of policies that ran counter to public sentiment. He was even criticized by the ruling party and is thus unqualified to carry out pending reform tasks in the education sector," the statement said.
The progressive Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union (KTU) also opposed Kim's Cabinet post, saying he has advocated a number of "abnormal" policies, including privatization of state-run universities.
"Kim is an outsider as far as education is concerned. We're deeply concerned about his ministerial post," the KTU said in a statement.
Seoul, July 3 (Yonhap News)
President Roh replaces three key ministers in partial Cabinet reshuffle |