Yoon faces uphill battle against opposition-controlled parliament
SEOUL, April 11 (Yonhap) -- The opposition's landslide victory in this week's parliamentary elections put President Yoon Suk Yeol in an even weaker position to move his agenda forward as the vote was seen as a midterm referendum on his administration.
Yoon had hoped the elections would allow his ruling People Power Party (PPP) to regain control of the National Assembly and help pass legislation key to fulfilling his campaign pledges and completing reforms during the remaining three years of his single, five-year term.
What transpired, however, was a resounding victory for the opposition bloc that was certain to not only stall his agenda but also prompt soul-searching within his administration and party, with Yoon becoming the first president since South Korea's democratization in 1987 to work with an opposition-controlled parliament for all five years of his term.
With eight seats still undecided, the combined 184 seats won by the opposition, including the main opposition Democratic Party (DP), its sister Democratic United Party and the fledgling Rebuilding Korea Party, is just shy of the 200 seats needed to single-handedly impeach the president. This demonstrates how close Yoon came to losing virtually all his powers as president and becoming an early lame duck.
The PPP and its sister People Future Party, meanwhile, took 106 seats.
With a three-fifths majority, the opposition can now fast-track contentious bills through parliament without the ruling party's approval and end a filibuster after 24 hours.
In the early days of his presidency, Yoon could have pushed policies on the back of public support, but that support has dwindled as seen in the election outcome and his approval ratings of 30-something percent in recent months.
A lack of cooperation from parliament threatens to derail Yoon's three major reform areas of education, pensions and labor, and likely undermines his medical reform plan, which he has pushed at the cost of major disruptions to health care services following a mass walkout by junior doctors.
A long list of other policy measures Yoon has introduced through a series of 24 town hall meetings since the start of the year could also meet an uncertain fate.
Political pundits say Yoon will have little choice but to reset his running of state affairs.
Internally, it could mean shaking up his Cabinet and the presidential office, while externally, it could mean reaching out to the opposition, including through a one-on-one meeting with DP leader Lee Jae-myung.
Yoon has never held such a meeting with Lee since taking office.
Other pundits, however, note that Yoon has a tendency to stick to principles and will not be easily swayed to change his running of state affairs.
A case in point is the ongoing standoff with doctors over his administration's decision to increase admissions to medical schools.
"It is not that I am pushing for reform because I don't know how to calculate political gains and losses," he said of the decision in an address to the nation earlier this month.
hague@yna.co.kr
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