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| Minister of Gender Equality and Family Chung Young-ai attends a meeting at Government Complex in Seoul on March 31, 2022. Joint Press Corps. |
By Ko Dong-hwan
The presidential transition committee announced it will appoint a new minister of gender equality and family. But questions remain about the fate of the ministry due to President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol's campaign pledge to abolish it, which has triggered a fierce backlash from civic and women's groups.
Ahn Cheol-soo, chairman of the presidential transition committee, said Thursday that it will slow down the reorganization of the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, while appointing a new minister to the post.
The new minister will diagnose what the problems are and develop a plan to reorganize the ministry "that is in line with the current times in a calm and in-depth manner," Ahn said in a press conference held at the committee's Tongui-dong office in Seoul's Jongno District.
"Rather than hurriedly coming up with a plan to reorganize the present government structure during the committee's limited period of operations (until Yoon's inauguration on May 10), the committee will focus on more pressing state matters…since domestic and international economic issues, as well as the issue of international security are currently of grave concern," said Ahn.
Ahn said the transition team will consider various opinions from both lawmakers of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) as well as experts in diverse fields and hold public hearings for the new administration's appointed nominees.
"We will shape the new administration piece by piece (instead of coming up with a plan to change it all at once)," Ahn said.
When asked exactly when the lineup for the new administration's cabinet will be determined, Ahn said the committee "will waste no time in doing so" and "will appoint the best people for our country by screening them through a stringent qualification assessment process."
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| A coalition of 35 local women's civic groups in Daegu protests in front of People Power Party's Daegu chapter on April 1, demanding that President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol withdraw his plan to abolish the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family. Newsis |
Yoon has been saying he will abolish the gender equality ministry since before he was elected on March 9. He once stated that the ministry "is done for" in terms of its role, in order to justify abolishing it.
If the incoming administration ultimately does abolish the ministry, it remains to be seen how the roles that it has been serving for two decades will be accommodated. It could possibly be renamed, replaced or downgraded to a smaller government organization or committee. Such questions are expected to surface during the National Assembly hearing for the new ministerial nominee.
Recently within Korean society, Yoon's proposed abolition of the gender equality and family ministry has fueled heated debate among politicians and prompted a significant backlash from civic organizations.
The Women Migrants Human Rights Center of Korea, an advocacy group for about 910,000 migrant women in Korea, released a statement in late March and protested the closure of the ministry. The group said that the ministry has been like a "control tower" overseeing all of the multicultural family support centers across the country, which are dedicated to supporting the rights and livelihood of migrant women. Instead of shutting the ministry down, the Yoon administration must expand and strengthen related policies to support migrant women more extensively and effectively, the group saidd.
Activists from 643 women's and civic groups, including Korean National Council of Women, Korea Women's Association United, Korea YWCA and the Korean League of Women Voters, released a joint statement on March 25, demanding that the Yoon administration strengthen the role of the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, rather than abolish it. They said that gender equality in Korea still has a long way to go, citing that the country ranks 102nd out of 156 countries in gender equality (2021) and that the country's gender wage gap is the worst in the OECD, at 31.5% (2020).
The Korean Association of Women's Studies and Korea Women's Association United jointly held a discussion forum on March 27 condemning Yoon's plan to abolish the gender equality ministry as merely a byproduct of the main opposition People Power Party's presidential election strategy ― which attempted to divide the country's voters along gender lines ― and didn't have any logical or reasonable grounds.
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