Jun Ji-hye, a reporter at the finance desk of The Korea Times, focuses primarily on economic policy and government agencies, mainly covering the Ministry of Finance and Economy, the Ministry of Budget and Planning, the National Tax Service and the Korea Customs Service. She previously covered financial authorities, including the Financial Services Commission and the Financial Supervisory Service, and earlier worked on the political, city and business desks, reporting on a wide range of issues.
Reps. Ahn, Kim to meet over nominations today
By Jun Ji-hye
Rep. Ahn Cheol-soo and Democratic Party (DP) Chairman Kim Han-gil will meet today to discuss eliminating party nominations for local elections.
The decision came after Ahn suggested holding a three-way meeting with the chairmen of the ruling Saenuri Party and the DP.
“Ahn suggested the meeting to Saenuri Chairman Rep. Hwang Woo-yea and Kim Han-gil Tuesday,” said an official from the recently established New Political Vision Party, Wednesday.
Ahn plans to officially launch his party in March, three months before the June 4 local elections.
The DP said Kim agreed to meet Ahn, while Hwang has yet to respond.
At the meeting, Ahn, a former independent presidential candidate, plans to stress that scrapping the practice of parties selecting candidates to stand for municipal mayors and councilors in the local elections was a key campaign pledge from all major candidates, including the ruling party’s President Park Geun-hye, DP’s Rep. Moon Jae-in and himself.
The top-down nomination system has been cited as a source of various forms of corruption in local politics.
The proposal came after he announced Monday that his party will keep his campaign pledge, saying it will not exercise its rights to nominate candidates in order to return such rights to the public.
However, the governing Saenuri Party on Tuesday decided to maintain the nomination system. It said it will introduce the bottom-up system as an alternative to the current top-down method.
Ahn said, “President Park and the governing side are showing a cowardly attitude and exhibiting dishonest behavior to the public.”
The former doctor and software millionaire also criticized the DP for backpedaling on its promise.
The largest opposition party, which previously had decided to scrap the system, recently moved to maintain it amid concerns that it could be beaten by the governing camp if the DP does not nominate candidates and the Saenuri Party does.
The party has yet to announce its official stance, but a number of lawmakers are said to be pushing for retaining it.
Some DP members expressed disagreement. Sohn Hak-kyu, a former DP chairman, said: “The DP needs to keep its promise, if it wants to hold President Park responsible for not fulfilling hers.”