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Sim Sang-jung, head of the National Assembly’s committee for political reform, holds a press conference related to the agreement of four major political parties to reform the electoral system on Mar. 18. (Kim Gyoung-ho, staff photographer)
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LKP heads main opposition to increasing proportional representation
Headway is being made on the reform of South Korea’s electoral system after all the major parties except for the Liberty Korea Party (LKP) -- that is, the Democratic Party, the Bareunmirae Party, the Party for Democracy and Peace and the Justice Party -- tentatively agreed to increase the number of proportional representatives in the National Assembly from 47 to 75 and to maximize the link between the votes received by individual parties and their seats in the National Assembly. This agreement came three months after the floor leaders of the ruling party and the four opposition parties agreed to discuss adopting a mixed-member proportional representation system. This was the first progress achieved by concerns that the public will is being distorted by the tendency for large parties to be overrepresented in the National Assembly and for less-organized and more poorly funded smaller parties to be marginalized. But before the plan to reform the electoral system by increasing proportionality and diversity is designated for the “fast track” and ultimately passed in a full session of the National Assembly, there are still obstacles to overcome, including internal opposition in each party. Increasing proportionality and representation in the electoral system “In respect of the spirit of the agreement reached by the five parties [in December 2018] and to reflect the wishes of the people, the four ruling and opposition parties have created a unified bill. When the bill is jointly submitted following a review by the National Assembly’s legal consultation office and endorsement by each party, the Special Committee for Political Reform will immediately take steps to designate it for the fast track,” said Sim Sang-jung, chair of the National Assembly’s Special Committee for Political Reform, during a press conference on Mar. 18. South Korea’s current electoral system is based on a winner-takes-all system in which only one person is elected for each electoral district, even if their margin of victory is a single vote. But objections have been raised to this system on the grounds that it doesn’t adequately reflect the popular will. In addition to wasting a lot of votes and exacerbating regionalism, it’s biased toward the two large parties, which end up receiving more seats than their support would merit. During the regional elections on June 13, 2018, the Democratic Party and the Korea Liberty Party swept 90% of the total seats in local legislatures around the country, provoking criticism about overrepresentation. Since then, progressive parties, alternative parties and civic groups have been spearheading calls for a reform of the electoral system. Bareunmirae Party Leader Sohn Hak-kyu and Justice Party Leader Lee Jeong-mi ended up launching a hunger strike at the National Assembly in December 2018. On the 10th day of Sohn and Lee’s hunger strike, Dec. 15, the floor leaders of the five parties (Hong Young-pyo of the Democratic Party, Na Kyung-won of the LKP, Kim Gwan-yeong of the Bareunmirae Party, Jang Byeong-wan of the Party for Democracy and Peace, and Yun So-ha of the Justice Party) held an emergency press conference in which they released an agreement about reorganizing the electoral system. In this agreement, the five parties agreed to review a proposal to implement a mixed-member proportional representation system and to discuss increasing the number of lawmakers in the National Assembly. “The public wants the electoral system reformed by creating a National Assembly that reflects the will of the people. They want us to increase proportionality and representation by rectifying the winner-takes-all election system and to eliminate the wasteful two-party divide by countering regionalism in order to create a National Assembly that is rational and best reflects diversity,” Sim said. Opposition from Bareunmirae Party and Party for Democracy and Peace But each party’s unique situation is creating some complex calculations. The Party for Democracy and Peace, which is based in the Honam region in the southwest, was the first of the parties to hold a meeting to discuss whether to endorse the reform plan for the electoral system, but it failed to reach a quorum for voting and moved to discuss the matter again on Mar. 19. “Letting the Democratic Party convince us of the plan for a mixed-member proportional representation system with 300 or fewer members would be worse than nothing. Just as it’s better to walk away from a paltry deal, not reaching an agreement might be better in the long run,” said Rep. Yu Seong-yeop, a member of the party’s supreme council, who expressed his opposition during the meeting. Even more trouble is brewing in the 29-seat Bareunmirae Party, which often plays the role of kingmaker in the National Assembly. Party members who originated in the pre-merger Bareun Party are reportedly strongly opposed to the very idea of fast-tracking the legislation. “I’ve heard that some lawmakers are even saying they’ll leave the party,” said Oh Sin-hwan, secretary-general of the Bareunmirae Party, during an interview with MBC Radio program “A Closer Look with Sim In-bo” on Monday. Ten members of the Bareunmirae Party’s nonparliamentary committee also issued a statement in opposition to fast-tracking. But the party leadership appears committed to ramming the plan through. While admitting that the electoral system reform plan “could be described as the ‘lesser or two evils,’” Sohn said that the party is determined to implement the mixed-member proportional representation system. “If we don’t put it on the fast track, all our efforts to reform the electoral system over the past months will go up in smoke,” he said. There’s been even fiercer pushback from the LKP, which did not take part in the talks between the four parties. The party convened an emergency joint session of party lawmakers and local party committee chairs aimed at “stopping the leftist dictatorship.” During the meeting, party head Hwang Kyo-ahn called the proposed reform “a legislative coup aimed at extending the life of the leftist dictatorship” while floor leader Na Kyung-won called it “collusion and an abnormal power grab.” Another challenge is coordinating reform legislation Along with a bill for reforming the electoral system, the four parties also face the challenge of drafting a bill for setting up an office for investigating crimes by senior officials and a unified bill for adjusting the investigative powers of the police and prosecutors. “Even today, I wish we could start negotiations with the opposition party about the reform bills, including the electoral system reform. We’ve had no choice but to take advantage of the fast track system because of 20 years of resistance [from the conservative opposition] to the senior official criminal investigation office,” said Democratic Party floor leader Hong Young-pyo during a meeting with reporters on Monday. For now, the floor leadership of the Bareunmirae Party is receptive to discussing reform legislation. “Since the negotiations about electoral legislation have been wrapped up to some extent, we can conduct a final survey of opinions inside the party about adjusting the police and prosecutors’ investigative authority and establishing a senior official criminal investigation office. After we’ve decided on the party’s position, we can start working with other parties to draft a single bill about those issues,” said Kim Gwan-yeong, floor leader for the Bareunmirae Party. Before these bills can actually be designated for the fast track, however, there are several more hurdles that must be cleared. First, the electoral system reform bill, which was created through working-level negotiations, needs to gain final approval from the floor leaders of the four parties. Second, the bill needs to receive official party endorsement during meetings of party lawmakers. Finally, the bills have to officially move through their respective committees, the electoral bill through the Special Committee for Political Reform and the bills about the senior official investigation office and the coordination of prosecutor and police investigative authority through the Special Committee for Judicial Reform. By Seo Young-ji and Jung Yu-gyung, staff reporters Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]
