LKP to put 1 lawmaker to vote for expulsion

Rep. Hong Young-pyo, fourth from left, the floor leader of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) and youth representatives from four political parties ― the DPK, the Bareunmirae Party, the Party for Democracy and Peace (PDP) and the Justice Party ― rally at the National Assembly, Thursday. / Yonhap

By Park Ji-won

Rep. Lee Jong-myeong

The main opposition Liberty Korea Party (LKP) decided Thursday to vote on whether to expel one of the three lawmakers accused of defaming victims of the May 18 Gwangju Uprising in 1980 from the party.

The LKP's Ethics Committee said Rep. Lee Jong-myeong will be kicked out of the party. It will also hold a meeting to decide on the fate of the remaining two, Reps. Kim Jin-tae and Kim Soon-rye, after the party's convention on Feb. 27 because they are running in the leadership election.

“The committee concluded that Lee's remarks have violated the spirit of the democratization movement and our core conservative values,” LKP secretary general Rep. Kim Yong-tae told reporters.

Lee can appeal the decision within 10 days, Kim said. If not, the party will hold a general meeting to put the decision to a vote. If more than 76 LKP lawmakers, or two-thirds, agree on his expulsion, Lee will be officially stripped of party membership. Lee can still serve as an independent lawmaker after being kicked out of the party.

Reps. Kim Jin-tae and Kim Soon-rye will not receive punitive measures immediately as the party rule stipulates a candidate of the national convention is suspended from receiving punitive measures from the party. Kim Jin-tae ran in the leadership race while Kim Soon-rye joined the election as a candidate for the party's Supreme Council.

“The party's ethics committee will again decide whether to take punitive measures against the two after the party convention,” Kim added.

Earlier, the party referred the three to the party's ethics committee amid growing public resentment over their remarks. Four other parties submitted a petition to the National Assembly, Sunday, calling for unseating them.

The lawmakers have come under fire for holding a seminar last week in which they invited a far-right figure Jee Man-won who insisted there that North Korean troops were involved in the pro-democracy movement. In the seminar, those lawmakers echoed Jee's view and made controversial remarks against the movement calling the victims of the government crackdown “monsters.”

Meanwhile, the committee also decided to warn Kim Byong-joon, chief of the LKP's governing body, who referred himself to the ethics committee for neglecting his duty as the LKP's interim leader to supervise them, which is not a punitive measure.

A Realmeter poll Thursday shows the approval rating of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK) increased 2 percentage points to 40.9 percent from last week, while that of LKP, plunged 3.2 percentage points to 25.7 percent. The pollster says the results were backed by the controversy caused by the three LKP lawmakers' alleged defamatory remarks on the May 18 movement.

In a separate survey conducted by the same pollster, 55 percent of those surveyed agreed with the need for a bill to punish those who try to distort facts about the May 18 movement while 35 percent opposed it.

Meanwhile, four political parties including the DPK continued to criticize the three LKP lawmakers calling on unseating them.

Youth representatives from four parties ― the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), the Bareunmirae Party, the Party for Democracy and Peace (PDP) and the Justice Party ― held an emergency gathering to protest against the three LKP lawmakers urging them to give up their seats.

DPK Reps. Sul Hoon and Min Byung-doo and PDP Rep. Choi Gyung-hwan filed a defamatory lawsuit Thursday with the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office against the three LKP lawmakers and Jee over their disrespectful remarks.