Serious Ideological Discord Over Political-Reform Theory

As Millennium Democratic Party’s (MDP) Rho Mu-Hyun insisted on democratic power-based political reform on the 27th, Lee In-Je responded with sharp criticism from an ideological perspective. Controversy over the issue of political reform is growing as an aspect of the electoral dispute.

Also, the president of Democratic People’s Party (DPP), Kim Yoon-Hwan, insisted on `unification of Youngnam-regional candidates`, and Grand National Party (GNP) defined Rho’s political-reform theory as `conspiracy to destroy the opposition`, urging him to withdraw from the candidacy.

Rho appeared on the TV Debate program, which was co-sponsored by Changwon-KBS and Masan-MBC, and said, “MDP should unite, expand, and reorganize the democratic power before the presidential election at the end of the year. This is my conviction and public commitment as a candidate in primaries, and I will appeal the matter to citizens. If support comes, I anticipate to act on political reform publicly.”

In response, Lee expressed his will to continue in primaries through a press interview at the party’s headquarter in Yeouido, Seoul, and said, “Our party must embrace both moderate progressivism and healthy conservatism, in order to prevent the party’s inclination to left-wing and I’ll commit myself for this.”

He, especially, criticized on Rho saying, “There seems to be certain external force applied in the process of primaries, as a particular competing candidate made an absurd insistence that he will give up vested rights and promote political reform, even if he becomes a candidate.”

Meanwhile, DPP’s president Kim Yoon-Hwan met reporters on the day and emphasized on the need of political reform by saying, “As MDP’s candidate Rho alone may not be enough to attain the regime, unified democratic and reformation influences and regional unification are needed to collect focused power.” He also added, “There should be some individuals in the GNP, willing to participate in the political reform.”

Spokesman of the United Liberal Democrats (ULD), Jung Jin-Suk, published a commentary and criticized that “looking at Rho’s utterance about political reform, he is an anti-parliamentary and anti-democratic radical reformist.”

In-Soo Song issong@donga.com · Young-Chan Yoon yyc11@donga.com