[Anchor]
Overnight, the Democratic Party of Korea (DP) unilaterally voted to appoint its own members to 11 standing committee chair positions, including the crucial Legislation and Judiciary Committee. While the People Power Party (PPP) has protested the move, the DP has stated that if the PPP refuses to take the remaining seven committee chair seats, it will claim those as well.
We have the first report of the day, Wednesday, July 1, from reporter Park Jae-yeon.
[Reporter]
During the plenary session of the National Assembly held last night, June 30, members of the Democratic Party were elected as chairs for 11 standing committees for the latter half of the 22nd National Assembly.
Out of the 18 total standing committee chair positions in the National Assembly, the DP pushed through the vote for 11 of them unilaterally, excluding seven.
[Cho Jung-sik / National Assembly Speaker: We intend to open the door to the latter half of the National Assembly by first forming 11 standing committees and electing their chairs.]
Seo Young-kyo was elected as the chair of the Legislation and Judiciary Committee, Kim Young-jin as the chair of the Public Administration and Security Committee, and Song Ki-hun as the chair of the Science, ICT, Broadcasting, and Communications Committee.
The People Power Party, protesting the forced passage of the motion, held a picket demonstration inside the National Assembly plenary chamber but did not participate in the vote.
[Please allow for bipartisan agreement!]
Floor leaders from both parties met several times before the plenary session to negotiate, but they ultimately failed to narrow their differences over the position of the Legislation and Judiciary Committee chair.
The PPP protested that National Assembly Speaker Cho Jung-sik, who is from the DP, forcibly assigned members to the 11 standing committees, and announced that all of its members would resign from their committee posts.
[Jung Jeom-sik / PPP Floor Leader: Please continue with such arrogant and self-righteous politics. We will not comply with a committee formation process that treats seats like scraps to be handed out.]
The Democratic Party maintains that it will offer the remaining seven standing committee chair positions to the PPP based on the ratio of parliamentary seats, but has warned that if the PPP continues to refuse to participate in the formation of the committees, it will take those seven seats as well.
[Han Byung-do / DP Floor Leader: I hope you do not even think about paralyzing the National Assembly and obstructing the livelihoods of the people and reform.]
Meanwhile, during last night's plenary session, the motion for the appointment of Han Seong-sook as Prime Minister was also passed under the leadership of the Democratic Party.
(Video Editing: Jeon Min-gyu)
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