SEOUL (AFP) – South Korea’s opposition leader yesterday urged ruling party lawmakers to side with the “people” and impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol over his failed martial law bid, a day before a second parliamentary vote that appears on a knife edge.
A week after a first attempt to remove Yoon for the martial law debacle foundered, the country’s National Assembly will vote today around 4pm (0700 GMT) on whether to impeach the president for “insurrectionary acts undermining the constitutional order”. Two hundred votes are needed for the measure to pass, meaning opposition lawmakers must convince eight ruling People Power Party (PPP) colleagues to defect.
As of noon yesterday, seven ruling party lawmakers had pledged to support impeachment – leaving the vote up in the air.
Yesterday, the leader of the Democratic Party, Lee Jae-myung, implored them to support the president’s removal from office.
“What the lawmakers must protect is neither Yoon nor the ruling People Power Party but the lives of the people wailing out in the freezing streets,” Lee said. “Please join in supporting the impeachment vote tomorrow. History will remember and record your choice.”
Two ruling party lawmakers supported the motion last week.
Lawmaker Kim Min-seok said yesterday he was “99 per cent” sure the impeachment will pass.
Should it be approved, Yoon will be suspended from office while South Korea’s Constitutional Court deliberates.
Prime Minister Han Duck-soo will step in as the interim president during that time.
The court will then have 180 days to rule on Yoon’s future. If it backs his removal, Yoon will become the second president in South Korean history to be successfully impeached.
There is also precedent for the court to block impeachment: in 2004, then-president Roh Moo-hyun was removed by Parliament for alleged election law violations and incompetence.
But the Constitutional Court later reinstated him.
The court also currently only has six judges, meaning their decision would need to be unanimous.
And should the vote fail, Yoon can still face “legal responsibility” for the martial law bid, a researcher at the Korea University Institute of Law Kim Hyun-jung told AFP. “This is clearly an act of insurrection,” she said.
“Even if the impeachment motion does not pass, the President’s legal responsibilities under the Criminal Code… cannot be avoided.”