Lee Min-hyung joined The Korea Times in 2014 and has worked as a journalist mainly in Korea’s finance, tech and automotive industry. He specializes in content creation, breaking news and in-depth analysis currently on transportation and mobility. You can reach him via mhlee@koreatimes.co.kr.
Petitioners demanding LKP disbandment top 1.5 million
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Seen above is a screep capture of an online petition demanding the disbandment of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party. Over 1.55 million people participated in the petition as of 4 p.m. Wednesday. Screen capture from Cheong Wa Dae's webpage
By Lee Min-hyung
By Lee Min-hyung
More than 1.5 million people have signed an online petition demanding the disbandment of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP).
The LKP claims the number was probably fabricated by the “leftists,” so it does not take it seriously.
This is the first time since President Moon Jae-in took office in May 2017 that such a record-setting number of people have signed an online request on the Cheong Wa Dae website.
As of 4 p.m. Wednesday, over 1.55 million participated in the petition, denouncing the LKP for getting in the way of every policy drive pushed by the Moon Jae-in administration.
The petition was posted on Apr. 22, accusing the opposition party of obstructing the government's plan to fast-track reform bills. The bills include electoral reform and the establishment of a new investigative authority focused on corruption among public officials.
The LKP, however, went all-out to block the move by holding a series of rallies and staging a sit-in protest inside the National Assembly.
Despite the unfavorable public sentiment over the LKP, the party's floor leader Rep. Na Kyung-won raised the possibility of manipulation of the petition.
“There is a high chance of manipulation (of the number of petitioners),” she said in a media interview. The LKP argued that a number of the petitioners accessed the website in Vietnam.
But the presidential house refuted the claim, saying that the online traffic from Vietnam only increased for two days from Mar. 14 when the K-pop singer Seungri's sexual misconduct scandal went viral.
“We analyzed the location of the visitors for the petition on Apr. 29 when its online traffic started surging, and 97 percent of the online users were based in Korea,” Cheong Wa Dae said in a statement.
The United States came in second, with 0.82 percent accessing the online petition from there.
Cheong Wa Dae is making all-out efforts to keep running a trustworthy online petition website, the statement said.
On top of that, more than 200,000 online users signed a petition calling for the disbandment of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK).
“The bills were put on the fast track for the political advantage of the ruling party,” the petition said.
The petition was posted on Apr. 29 and it took about two days for more than 200,000 people to join the petition.