Rival parties engage in tug-of-war

The ruling and opposition parties are expected to be at loggerheads over who is responsible for crippling operations at the National Assembly.

The rival parties are blaming each other for the parliament`s failure to act on the supplementary budget bill, revisions to the Pharmaceutical Affairs Law and other legislation related to the people`s livelihood.

They are, however, expected to resume negotiations through their floor leaders shortly to discuss convening a special Assembly session once again to deal with the bills.

The ruling Millennium Democratic Party (MDP) plans to submit a written request for the convocation of the 214th extraordinary session through consultations with the opposition party at the earliest possible date.

But the opposition Grand National Party (GNP) maintains that the ruling camp should first apologize for the railroading of the amendment to the National Assembly Law in the Legislation-Judiciary Committee, and claims the House session should be convened toward the end of August.

In particular, the GNP repeated its demand that President Kim Dae-Jung apologize for the railroadingof the Assembly Law revision bill and and nullify it. The party rejected the proposal for a meeting between floor leaders.

MDP chairman Rep. Suh Young-hun, expressing regrets over the stalled House operations, said he intends to apologize to settle the dispute over the railroading of the bill.

He said that the Assembly should be held in the near future, and called for the early normalization of Assembly operations.