[News Analysis] Impeachment prospects darken

Whatever President Park Geun-hye had in mind for Tuesday’s surprise offer to curtail her term in office, it appears to have lifted her chances of surviving an imminent parliamentary impeachment vote.

Whether intentionally or not, she may have also effectively diminished the chances of untangling South Korea from its worst political quagmire in recent history that stemmed from a scandal involving herself and her confidante Choi Soon-sil.

“I just had a phone conservation with a few of (the ruling) Saenuri Party lawmakers. It seems like the prospects of Park’s impeachment have darkened,” said Rep. Park Jie-won, chief of the People’s Party, one of the three opposition parties campaigning for the presidential impeachment.

The party, along with the main opposition Democratic Party of Korea and the far-left Justice Party, has been pushing for a parliamentary motion -- as early as this Friday -- to remove Park from office.

For its passage, the opposition needs at least 28 votes from Park’s allies in the parliament.

Before the president made her nationally televised address Tuesday, Rep. Park had expressed confidence in the ballot, saying that nearly 60 lawmakers from the Seanuri side favor Park’s impeachment.

Rep. Suh Chung-won, a key Saenuri figure known to be loyal to the president, also spoke of the change of mood toward impeachment.

“The opposition wanted the president to resign and pushed for the impeachment because she refused to do so,” he said.

“Now that the president offers to resign, there is no reason to push for her impeachment.”

However, the three opposition parties Tuesday reconfirmed their unified push to remove the president from her post via impeachment. They earlier in the day agreed to put the parliamentary motion to a vote Friday.

“We will make sure the impeachment motion clears the Assembly within this week,” said Democratic Party’s floor leader Rep. Woo Sang-ho.

As of Tuesday, opposition parties and independents combined control 172 seats in the 300-member Assembly. Assuming they all vote in favor of the motion, at least 28 Saenuri lawmakers must join the move to meet the required 200.

Polls show Park’s approval ratings have plummeted to an abysmal 4 percent and a vast majority of the public want her immediate ouster, but the ruling party lawmakers have been reluctant to join the move to unseat Park, as they are mindful of its possible negative impact on their own political fortunes. Political observers have warned that since an impeachment vote is a secret ballot, Saenuri lawmakers may not act as how they said would.

The opposition-led impeachment motion calls for Park’s removal on the grounds that she undermined the core democratic value, as stated in the Constitution, by letting her friend interfere in state affairs.

Other charges facing Park include that she leaked classified presidential documents to Choi. Despite having no official position and no security clearance, Choi was granted access to and edited speeches about reunification with North Korea.

But the opposition parties have clashed over whether to include other allegations surrounding Park. Among them was the allegation that she was involved with the graft scandal tied to her presidential aides and local conglomerates.

Democratic Party and minor far-left Justice Party have decided to add bribery charges to their own draft version of the impeachment motion. People’s Party, on the other hand, has cited the allegation as circumstantial evidence.

By Lee Sun-young & Yeo Jun-suk () ()