Confidence Vote Switches to Impeachment

“President Roh Moo-hyun is eligible to be impeached simply by looking at him giving a break to his close aides and concealing their corruption allegations,” Choe Byung-yul, who heads the main opposition Grand National Party (GNP), said on October 14. “In case President Roh is proven to be involved in any of his aides’ corruption scandals, the bottomline that counts would be an impeachment rather than an assessment of confidence.”

Rep. Choe said in a speech at the National Assembly yesterday and added, “The former presidential aide Choi Do-sul’s suspicions should be wholly revealed by Roh’s words, by the prosecution, and possibly by the special prosecution in case of more detailed investigations. After this, the national vote for confidence could be implemented.” Choe’s claim is based on the idea of “Investigation comes first, referendum comes next.”

Along with Choe’s speech, Millennium Democratic Party(MDP) leader Park Sang-Chun yesterday announced, “President Roh deserves impeachment if he violated the constitutional law and pushes forward the national referendum,” which is now changing the political controversy from a confidence issue to impeachment. Rep. Park is expected to deliver a speech with the same idea at the National Assembly on October 15.

Currently, the ratio of parliamentary seat consists of 149 for GNP, 62 for MDP, 44 for People’s Participatory United New Party, and 10 for United Liberal Democrats (ULD). The number of seats occupied by the three major opposition parties are more than two-thirds (272 seats) of the total number of seats, which implicitly shows a power to impeach the President.

Accordingly, national referendum as a means of assessment for public confidence of the president is more likely to fade away this year, now that GNP firmly insists on an investigation of the president’s aides, and MDP is adhering to block a national vote for reason of an unconstitutional attempt.

Leaders and floor leaders of the three major oppositions, GNP, MDP and ULD, will have a joint meeting on October 15 and tune their thoughts on the referendum issue for a final time.

Meanwhile, regarding GNP leader Choe’s speech, the Blue House said, “ President Roh has fully accepted GNP’s request for ‘carrying out national referendum at the earliest time’.” Blue House officials blamed GNP for “making intentional excuses against a national vote by mentioning special prosecution, even before the completion of Choi’s allegation.”

In a press conference yesterday, Blue House public relations secretary Lee Byung-wan said, “It is very astonishing that GNP, some members of which were either judged guilty for embezzling 100 billion won from National Intelligence Service or facing prosecution’s summon for receiving 10 billion won of SK Group’s secret money, can be bold and fearless enough to refer to this as a scandal.”