Just elected, he wants grand changes

Rhyu Simin, the newly-elected legislator who belongs to the small People’s Party for Reform, already has plans for a wide-ranging political realignment of Korean politics. Mr. Rhyu had been endorsed by the ruling Millennium Democrats in Thursday’s off-term elections in three legislative districts. The Millennium Democrats lost to Grand National Party candidates in the other two districts.
“I propose that reformists from our party, the MDP and the GNP and other democratic-reform figures outside the political arena come together to create a new party,” Mr. Rhyu said yesterday after his victory. “Reform forces in the GNP and MDP had been renting out rooms in their parties because of regionalism,” he said, exhorting reformers to join forces and rid the National Assembly of “out-dated conservatives” in the next Assembly elections a year from now.
Political observers say he may be at the crest of a wave, at least in his call to set up ideological battle lines in Korean politics. They predicted an eventual political realignment that would replace Koreans’ traditional preference for electing someone with ties to their region of the country.
Mr. Rhyu’s win gave his party its second seat in the legislature; he joins Kim Won-wung in the Assembly. But the GNP’s victories in Uijeongbu and in Seoul increased its majority in the legislature to 153. President Roh Moo-hyun’s Millennium Democrats have 101.
The GNP also won the mayor’s seat in Kongju, South Chungcheong province, one of two such up for grabs. An independent candidate won the mayor’s job in Koje, South Gyeongang province. In the four significant council seats up for grabs, the GNP won one, the regionally-based United Liberal Democrats won two in South Chungcheong province, an independent won one and another small party, the Hanaro Peoples’ Coalition, won one. None of the seven MDP candidates running in local elections prevailed.
Mr. Rhyu is closer to the president politically and personally than many members of the MDP, especially the Donggyo-dong faction of Kim Dae-jung loyalists that controlled the party for most of the former president’s tenure. Under those conditions, speculation about a political realignment that flourished during last year’s presidential campaign has revived.
Reformist MDP officials, such as Representative Shin Ki-nam and Im Jong-seok, fed that speculation. “The defeat illustrates that the name ‘Millennium Democratic Party’ no longer means much,” said Mr. Shin. Mr. Im added, “The party was given a death sentence, and it is time to set up a new one.”
But the general mood of the party is more about internal reforms than broader political realignment. Kim One-ki, a member of the new party leadership, asked rhetorically yesterday, “Do we have to dance to the tune of the People’s Party for Reform?” The Blue House had no comment on the election results except to note that the party and the administration do not move in lockstep. “The results are something that the party should deal with,” said Yoo Ihn-tae, the presidential adviser for political affairs, despite indications that the Blue House has its eye set on recapturing the legislature next year.

by Lee Sang-il