The Democratic Party of Korea will hold a party convention on Aug. 2 to elect a new party leader. The party leader election will reflect the voting rights of party members, emphasizing the recent Democratic Party's commitment to member sovereignty, with a 55% share for voting rights members.
The Democratic Party Convention Preparatory Committee held its first meeting at the National Assembly on the afternoon of the 16th and made this decision. During this convention, a by-election will be held for the previous representative, Lee Jae-myung, who was elected president, and the Supreme Council member, Kim Min-seok, who was nominated as the Prime Minister. The terms of the newly elected party leader and supreme council members will last until next August.
The name of the convention has been decided as "the 2nd extraordinary national party members' congress." The convention will proceed with preliminary elections starting from the 15th of next month if there are more than three candidates for party leader and more than three candidates for supreme council member. Subsequently, on the 19th of next month, voting will be held in the Chungcheong region, on the 20th in the Yeongnam region, on the 26th in the Honam region, on the 27th in the metropolitan area, and on Aug. 2 in Seoul, Gangwon, and Jeju, encompassing five regions.
In strengthening party member sovereignty, the party leader will be elected by reflecting a ratio of 15% from delegates, 55% from voting rights members, and 30% from the national voting group (opinion polls). Previously, the election of supreme council members was amended to be selected by combining the ratios of 50% from central delegates and 50% from voting rights members.
Overseas voting rights members will conduct online voting every time they hold a regional preliminary election. The national opinion poll will target the Democratic Party's supporters and the undecided, and will be aggregated using assurance numbers over two days with 2,000 samples.
Candidate registration will only be accepted on the 10th of next month. Currently, the only person who has expressed intent to run for party leader is Representative Jeong Cheong-rae, while it is also reported that former floor leader Park Chan-dae is considering running. If there are more than three candidates, a runoff vote will be conducted as necessary. The convention preparations will be managed by Representative Cheon Jun-ho for planning, Representative Jeong Il-young for organization, and Representative Im Ho-sun for general affairs and publicity.
Representative Park Ji-hye, serving as the spokesperson for the Preparatory Committee, said, "If there are more than three candidates and no one receives a majority of votes in the first online vote, a runoff vote will exclude the third-place candidate, and voting will be conducted for two candidates as needed."