NPAD hardliners urge floor leader to quit Sewol bill negotiations

Park Young-sun, floor leader of the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy (NPAD), dropped her plan to leave the embattled party on Wednesday, but some hardline party members urged her to step down her post "as soon as possible."

About 10 hardliners met at the National Assembly to discuss the situation. Rep. Yoo Seung-hui expressed regret over recent controversies over Park`s exit from the party but said she accepted Park`s offer to resign from the post of floor leader. Yoo urged the NPAD to convene a meeting of its lawmakers to collect their opinions. After Park said she would continue the negotiations with the ruling Saenuri Party over a bill on the Sewol ferry disaster, Yoo insisted that the party will decide at a general meeting whether Park continue working on the negotiations.

The NPAD`s floor leadership surveyed all of the party`s lawmakers, asking if they agree to a proposal that Park remains in charge of the negotiations before resigning from the floor leader post. However, the hardliners refused to respond. Out of a total of 129 NPAD lawmakers, excluding Park, about 20 lawmakers failed to participate in the survey.

Another hardliner, Eun Soo-mi, said on Twitter that Park should get out of the negotiations and that the party should recreate a fact-finding team. "It is embarrassing for the one who had been under pressure for resignation due to the failed negotiations for the special bill on Sewol to mention her bolting out of the party and hold a survey (on confidence in her leadership)," Eun told reporters. She had insisted that a fact-finding committee on the Sewol be granted the authority for investigation and indictments.

However, Lee Un-ju, a moderate lawmaker, told a radio talk show that Park is the party`s "valuable asset" despite her faults, calling for "comradeship" among the party members.