The main opposition party on Monday approved the first batch of reform measures aimed at restructuring the party’s leadership ahead of next year’s general election.

Under the reform plan, the party will abolish the secretary-general post, a key position that was given authority to nominate members for elections.

Out of the 395 New Politics Alliance for Democracy officials present for the vote, 302 voted in favor of revising the party’s regulations to reflect the reform package. 

The move came a week after NPAD approved its reform committee’s draft plans that aim to overhaul the party leadership. The NPAD leadership has been criticized for failing to address the party’s in-house conflicts among different factions.

“If power is concentrated in the hands of few people, it will inevitably cause a problem,” said Kim Sang-kon, head of NPAD’s reform committee.

“The party’s revised regulation will prevent few party members from dominating the power and give more say to the people and ordinary party members,” said Kim.

The revision includes other measures such as holding out the party’s nomination for those NPAD members who lost their post due to corruption charges. Besides, NPAD decided to build a new in-house audit system and remove party members involved in corruption.

The party, however, decided to postpone the discussion over other thorny issues such as a plan to abolish the Supreme Council and establish an evaluation committee to assess the performance of its elected officials.

“We will discuss other reform measures in the next September session,” said NPAD chairman Moon Jae-in. “If we reach an agreement (on those issues), we will be able to see the party achieve its goal of sharing power with ordinary party officials,” said Moon.

By Yeo Jun-suk (jasonyeo@heraldcorp.com)