On the 12th, the People Power Party amended its party constitution to allow the Central Party Nomination Management Committee to recommend candidates for basic local government heads and proportional city and provincial councilors in metropolitan cities with a population of 500,000 or more in the June 3 local elections.
The People Power Party said it convened a nationwide committee remotely at the National Assembly that day, introduced an agenda item with these details, and, after an automated response system (ARS) vote, approved the amendment to the party constitution as originally drafted. In the ARS vote, 609 of 831 nationwide committee members (73.3% turnout) participated, and 481 (78.9% approval) voted in favor of the amendment.
The amendment allows the Central Party Nomination Management Committee to nominate candidates for heads of basic local governments and proportional city and provincial councilors in jurisdictions with populations of 500,000 or more, or in districts, cities, and counties approved by the supreme council.
Accordingly, the Central Party will exercise the nomination authority for the district heads of Seoul's Songpa District, where lawmakers Bae Hyun-jin and Park Jung-hoon of the pro-Han (pro-Han Dong-hoon) faction, who have clashed with the Jang Dong-hyeok leadership, have constituencies, and Seoul's Gangnam District, where lawmaker Ko Dong-jin has a constituency.
Through the amendment, the People Power Party created a new rule that, if four or more elected supreme council members, including youth supreme council members, resign to seek nominations in local elections and their seats become vacant, a by-election will be held without installing an emergency response committee. This is intended to prevent the leadership from being automatically dissolved when supreme council members resign to run in local elections and to ensure stable party operations.
In the current leadership, Supreme Council member Kim Jae-won has declared a run for North Gyeongsang governor, Supreme Council member Shin Dong-wook is running for Seoul mayor, and Supreme Council member Yang Hyang-ja is reportedly considering a run in the National Assembly by-election for Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi.
In addition, the amendment includes provisions to align the start date of the terms for elected supreme council members with that of a newly elected party leader if a runoff is held in the party leader election, and to clarify the clause on forming the evaluation committee for elected public officials.