Park Ji-won is a writer for The Korea Times who has been covering a wide range of topics from Korea’s culture to its politics. An avid journalism enthusiast to the core, Ji-won brings a thoughtful and unique perspective to every topic she covers. On weekends, you'll often find her contemplating life’s purpose on a yoga mat — with a cup of quality tea in hand. A native Korean speaker by birth and fluent in English through her work, she went to college in Japan and is learning Chinese and French — hoping to add Polish, Russian and Thai to the mix.
Minor parties continue hunger strike demanding electoral reform
Sohn Hak-kyu, left, the leader of the minor opposition Bareunmirae Party, and Lee Jeong-mi, the leader of the Justice Party, stage hunger strikes for five days at the National Assembly, Monday. The two urged the two largest parties to support electoral reform by introducing a proportional electoral system. / Yonhap
By Park Ji-won
By Park Ji-won
The leaders of two minor opposition parties continued their hunger strike for the fifth consecutive day, Monday, demanding talks with the two biggest parties for electoral reform.
Bareunmirae Party (BMP) Chairman Sohn Hak-kyu and Justice Party leader Rep. Lee Jeong-mi braved cold weather to continue the strike in the lobby of the National Assembly, calling for the introduction of a new proportional representation system that is viewed as more advantageous to minor parties.
In his speech to commemorate his 100th day as chief of the BMP, Sohn said his won't stop his fight until his demand is met.
“The proposed system better reflects the people's choice in general elections. That is the way to reinforce the power of the Assembly and reduce the tyranny of the imperial presidency,” Sohn said during a press conference.
His move came after the two largest parties, the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) and Liberty Korea Party (LKP), approved the record government budget bills for next year while smaller parties boycotted the vote to demand electoral reform.
“Unless we make a multi-party system that can monitor big parties, our politics will never get better,” Lee said.
“I made it clear I will never quit the hunger strike unless (large parties) immediately start a National Assembly session to give a clear answer over the direction of electoral reform and come up with an agreement at the politics reform committee based on that answer.”
A hypothetical result conducted by Hankook Ilbo, shows, if proportional representation and single-member district systems were retrospectively applied to the last general elections, the ruling DPK would have won 110 seats with a 34.3 percent support rating, while the LKP, the People's Party and the Justice Party would have won 105, 83 and 23 seats, respectively.
According to the results, the DPK, which currently has 129 seats, would have lost 19 seats while the LKP with 112 seats would have lost two seats. The BMP and the Party for Democracy and Peace, which have 30 and 14 seats, respectively, would have gained 39 more seats, while the Justice Party, with five seats, would have had 18 more seats.
Meanwhile, an alliance of three minor parties, non-parliamentary parties and civic organizations, held press conferences separately Monday at the National Assembly to urge electoral reform and criticize the DPK and LKP for their political collusion, urging them to support the electoral reform.