Uri Party Caucus May Be Canceled

Amid the factional feud in the Uri Party between lawmakers pushing to create a new party and those who oppose the idea over a new party constitution of Uri Party, a new speculation arose on January 17. The speculation is that the minutes of a cross-party meeting held in June 2006, when participants decided to hand over the right to amend the party constitution to the new leadership committee, was manipulated.

Last June, Uri held a cross-party meeting and handed over the right to revise the party constitution from the central committee to the leadership committee. In November 2006, the leadership committee made changes to the party rules on rank-and-file member status, executive member status, and merit-based membership.

Rank-and-file members of Uri filed a provisional injunction to the court to annul the constitution revision last December, arguing, “The leadership committee has no authority to amend the party constitution.” But the committee kept arguing based on the minutes, “There was no problem in the procedure in that two thirds of the registered members participated in the meeting.”

But the court analyzed the tape recording and found out the minutes was not telling the whole truth. According to the recording, 49 voted yes, 5 voted no, and 16 abstained unlike the minutes that said 70 participated in the meeting out of the total 80 members and all 70 participants voted yes. Somebody falsified the document.

In regard to this, one of the committee members said, “One of the members who wrote the minutes seemed to make a mistake.”

If the court rules the revision is invalid, the party caucus scheduled in February 14 is likely to be cancelled.

It is hard for Uri Party to meet the timetable if the court nullifies the amendment because the party fixed the schedule for the caucus and election of delegates based on the amended party rules.

The court will probably make a decision before the Uri Party starts preparing for the caucus on January 20.

mindy@donga.com