The Democratic Party of Korea's supreme council decided Tuesday to adopt a preferential voting system for the party leader election at the Aug. 17 national convention. A separate proposal to reserve one supreme council seat for a youth representative was voted down.
Chief spokesperson Kang Jun-hyeon told reporters after a closed-door supreme council meeting at the National Assembly that the party had amended its rules "to minimize controversy over regulations related to leadership selection ahead of the third regular national party congress." The key change, he said, "explicitly codifies preferential voting and runoff voting as methods for conducting a runoff."
The party's national convention preparatory committee had earlier approved both the preferential voting system and the youth supreme council seat proposal, but the supreme council had been unable to reach a final decision — until Tuesday.
Under the preferential voting system, voters rank candidates in order of preference — first, second and third — on a single ballot.
If no candidate wins a majority, the second-choice votes of those who ranked the last-place candidate first are added to the totals to determine the winner.
The party leader race has been shaping up as a many-against-one contest, with former Prime Minister Kim Min-seok and former party leader Song Young-gil among those running against former party leader Jung Chung-rae. Many had expected preferential voting to disadvantage Jung, which is why council members aligned with him had opposed it.
The pro-Jung faction ultimately agreed to accept preferential voting in the spirit of "party first, self second," paving the way for the rule change. Supreme council member Park Gyu-hwan told reporters immediately after the meeting that he "honestly cannot understand" why others had "so persistently pushed a particular voting method, even in violation of the party constitution and rules," but said he had no choice but to act. "However, I could not bring the ruling Democratic Party — which must run and keep running without a moment's rest, bearing unlimited responsibility for state affairs and working for the people and the success of the Lee Jae Myung government — to a halt," Park said. "Because I had to prevent a complete breakdown, I had no choice but to make this decision."
Park added: "I think I now understand the heart of the real mother who stood before Solomon's court. Out of love, out of the need to keep it alive, she had no choice but to give up her own rights. Endlessly frustrated and aggrieved, yet with the heart of a true mother, we reluctantly set aside our convictions for now in order to save a party facing a thousand-foot cliff." Pro-Jung council member Lee Sung-yoon announced his resignation from the supreme council the same day.
The proposal to set aside one of the five elected supreme council seats for a youth representative was rejected by a vote of the council. That measure had also been seen as unfavorable to the pro-Jung faction. Chief spokesperson Kang said the matter "will likely need to be referred back to the preparatory committee for further discussion," adding, "There may be various ways to approach this, so please watch and wait."
sunpine@heraldcorp.com
