SEOUL – South Korean lawmakers are moving to ensure the nation never again has a president as powerful as Park Geun-hye.
A bipartisan parliamentary committee began meeting in January to rewrite the constitution for the first time since 1987, when mass protests forced a military junta to adopt a direct presidential vote. In recent months, hundreds of thousands of South Koreans have hit the streets to call for Park’s removal over an influence-peddling scandal that led to her impeachment.
Suggestions to the committee have included everything from a British-style parliamentary government to France’s system, where the president handles foreign affairs and the prime minister deals with domestic issues. The panel aims to release a proposal in a few months, which would need support from two-thirds of the 300-member National Assembly and then face a national referendum.
“Proposals vary, but the idea is the same: divide the powers of the president,” said Chun Jung-bae, a former justice minister and People’s Party lawmaker who sits on the committee. “We live in an extraordinary time, and the task of that time is to end the winner-takes-it-all system.”
The move to revise the constitution is part of efforts to curtail the cozy ties between the president and family-run conglomerates that dominate Asia’s fourth-biggest economy. That could affect the economy, which is already weakening over the discord as consumer confidence falls near an eight-year low.
“Decision-making and policy implementation would become slower in lieu of a single person with overwhelming power to push forward agendas,” said Jang Sang-hwan, who teaches economics at Gyeongsang National University. “That means more debate among lawmakers but more responsible crafting of policies in the long run.”
South Korean presidents have traditionally flexed their muscles with parliament, a legacy of the dictatorship that ran the country until the 1980s.
