Chief Justice Jo Hee-de on the 4th accepted Supreme Court Justice Park Young-jae's offer to resign as head of the National Court Administration. A successor will not be appointed for now, and National Court Administration Vice Minister Ki Woo-jong will serve as acting head for the time being.
According to legal sources, Jo accepted Park's resignation on the morning of the same day. As a result, Park stepped down as head of the National Court Administration and returned to hearing cases.
Jo did not separately appoint a successor to head the administration. With the Supreme Court now operating as a 13-member body including the chief justice following Supreme Court Justice Roh Tae-ak's retirement the previous day, it appears he chose to first minimize any gap in trial operations. The reassignment or composition of smaller panels has not yet been decided.
For the time being, Vice Minister Ki will act as head of the administration. The National Court Administration is an organ under the Supreme Court that, under the chief justice's delegated authority, oversees judicial administration at courts nationwide and handles external affairs, including those with the National Assembly.
Park on the 27th of last month told Jo that he intended to resign as head of the administration. It is said he firmed up his resignation after the Democratic Party of Korea pushed the so-called "three judiciary bills" onto the National Assembly's plenary agenda and passed them despite the judiciary's expressions of concern.
In May last year, Park served as the presiding justice before referral to the full bench in the Supreme Court appeal of then-presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung's Public Official Election Act case. After he was appointed head of the National Court Administration, he faced intense attacks from Democratic Party of Korea lawmakers at The National Assembly's Legislation and Judiciary Committee.
Inside and outside the judiciary, the view is that as the Democratic Party of Korea rapidly advanced judicial legislation following the president's election, the head of the administration—who should have functioned as the external communication channel—ended up in the middle of the National Assembly's pressure campaign against the judiciary, and with the related bills passed, Park decided to resign after much deliberation.