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| ▲ People Power Party Chairman Lee Jun-seok (Yonhap) |
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| ▲ People Power Party Chairman Lee Jun-seok (R) speaks during the first meeting of senior ruling party and government officials since the inauguration of the Yoon Suk-yeol government held at the prime minister's official residence in Seoul on July 6, 2022. (Yonhap) |
(2nd LD) PPP chief-ethics committee
(2nd LD) Ruling party suspends leader's party membership over sexual bribery scandal
(ATTN: RECASTS lead, headline; UPDATES throughout with meeting result; TRIMS)
By Lee Minji
SEOUL, July 8 (Yonhap) -- The ruling People Power Party suspended the party membership of leader Lee Jun-seok on Friday over allegations of sexual bribery and cover-up, a decision that is expected to unseat him as party chairman, throw the party into confusion and deepen an intraparty power struggle.
The PPP's ethics committee said Lee's membership will be suspended for the next six months.
The committee delivered the verdict after a near eight-hour meeting over allegations that Lee received sexual services paid for by a businessman seeking his influence in 2013 and attempted to cover up the wrongdoing earlier this year after the allegations surfaced.
Lee has pleaded innocence.
The decision represents the biggest crisis yet for Lee, who sensationally rose to the PPP chairmanship last year amid hopes the young, Harvard-educated politician would resuscitate the then moribund conservative party. He was the first person in his 30s to take the helm of a major political party in South Korea.
Under Lee, the PPP won March's presidential election and June's nationwide local elections.
Ever since taking over as leader, however, Lee has constantly been at odds with key party members considered close to President Yoon Suk-yeol, who have been collectively dubbed "Yoonhaekgwan" -- an abbreviation of "Yoon Suk-yeol's core associates."
Lee has claimed the ethics committee meeting was political machinations engineered by Yoonhaekgwan.
While a suspension in party membership is the second-lowest level of action in the PPP's four-tier disciplinary system, the decision is expected to deal a major blow not only to Lee but also to the ruling party that won the presidential election in a remarkably close race.
Any punishment stronger than a warning was expected to prompt the ruling party to elect a new leader, given that Lee's chairmanship is set to end in June next year. The PPP can either hold a national convention or form a collective "emergency leadership committee."
The scandal has persistently dogged Lee since Hover Lab, a far right-wing YouTube channel, first raised the sexual bribery allegations in December. The channel raised fresh allegations months later that Lee sent an aide to the person accusing him of sexual bribery to obtain a statement denying the allegations in exchange for a 700 million-won (US$538,710) investment promise.
Earlier Thursday, the aide, Kim Cheol-geun, claimed his innocence, arguing in a Facebook post that the promise for investment came from "goodwill" and is irrelevant to Lee's case.
The ethics committee suspended Kim's party membership for the next two years.
Many believe Lee will not succumb easily. The PPP chairman has stressed that he cannot accept any decision until an ongoing police probe is finalized.
The ethics committee said its decision to suspend Lee's party membership was for causing injury to the party's reputation, adding that suspicions of him receiving sexual services had not been considered.
The committee's decision is expected to reshape the party's power structure at a time when Lee is embroiled in a power struggle over party leadership with a pro-Yoon faction of PPP lawmakers.
Even if Lee accepts Thursday's decision and temporarily leaves the party, it could spur a fresh round of power struggle among party members fighting to clinch party leadership.
Apart from the PPP's internal disciplinary process, police are separately investigating the allegations.
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