Ruling party officials offer to resign en masse to shake up presidential campaign DATE: 2024-10-18 20:29:31
Rep. Youn Kwan-suk, the party's secretary-general, said the decision involved himself and four other lawmakers in political posts who wished to "put the party before self."
The others are chief policymaker Park Wan-joo, deputy chief policymaker You Dong-soo, chief spokesperson Koh Yong-jin and chief strategist Song Kap-seok.
"The people are demanding that the Democratic Party be born again into a new Democratic Party through many reforms," Youn told a press conference at the National Assembly.
"We will go back to where we started and take the lead in radically transforming the party from a spirit of unity and do our best individually to win the presidential election," he said, adding that they plan to tender their resignation to DP Chairman Song Young-gil.
The mass resignation comes amid a growing sense of urgency within the party as Lee's support ratings have lagged behind those of main opposition People Power Party candidate Yoon Seok-youl.
Youn admitted that the ratings were a factor in their resignation, which comes three days after the party's lawmakers unanimously agreed to give Lee full authority to reform the DP election campaign committee. (Yonhap)