Three party leaders quit posts, demanding leadership shakeup



Grand National Party chief Hong Joon-pyo said on Wednesday he would lead efforts to rebuild the embattled party, resisting mounting pressure for him to step down and allow Park Geun-hye, the party’s strongest presidential candidate, to take charge.

“This is not that I want to keep my post. I want to act responsibly,” he told a press conference at the National Assembly in Seoul. As head of a ruling party, he should work to have next year’s budget plan passed through the National Assembly and handle many other pending issues despite the opposition’s boycott of the parliament, he added.

Earlier in the day, three members of the party’s top decision-making Supreme Council announced their resignations in demonstration of their disapproval of Hong.

“I am stepping down from the Supreme Council to take responsibility for all the troubles the party is in now,” said Rep. Yoo Seong-min, one of the three. Reps. Nam Kyung-pil and Won Hee-ryong announced their departure from the council in separate press conferences.

A sense of crisis has been growing among GNP members that the conservative party, in its current form, will be crushed by a resurgent opposition in parliamentary and presidential elections next year. The GNP has suffered a series of major setbacks in recent months, including a defeat in October’s Seoul mayoral by-election and a hacking scandal. Park, the party’s former chairwoman seen as its best shot at the next presidency, is tracing behind Ahn Cheol-soo, a venture entrepreneur-turned-professor, in polls, although Ahn hasn’t said he will run.

The trio’s collective resignation underline such concerns.

“I think party leaders should give up everything and start disbanding the party and start efforts from scratch to win back the public confidence,” Rep. Nam said.

Dealing a severe blow to the already-embattled party, police arrested earlier this month an aide of a GNP lawmaker for allegedly directing a cyber attack against the national election watchdog on the Oct. 26 Seoul mayoral by-election. Opposition parties claim the ruling party may have been behind the hacking, which was aimed at hindering young voters from finding their polling booth. The GNP’s candidate lost to Park Won-soon in the election.



By Lee Sun-young
(milaya@heraldcorp.com)