Rep. Park Geun-hye has cleared the biggest hurdle to her comeback in more than five years as the leader of the embattled ruling Grand National Party.
On Wednesday, she met a group of reformist GNP lawmakers who had vociferously called for dissolving the party to create a new one. They threatened to leave the party should Park reject their demands. Two hot-tempered lawmakers did declare their departure from the party on Monday.
Park was in principle against disbanding the GNP. She regarded it as nothing more than a political charade. But the soft-spoken leader managed to convince the fractious lawmakers of her will to “reform the party to the core.”
What led the lawmakers to retract their demand for dissolution of the party was Park’s commitment to a fair and transparent nomination of candidates for the April general election. She promised to introduce a system that would select candidates in a thoroughly unbiased way.
Her flexibility toward their demand for changing the party name also worked.
By smoothing over the differences with the reformist lawmakers, Park demonstrated her ability to persuade and bargain.
As the intraparty feud subsided, the party revised its charter Thursday to pave the way for her to become a powerful interim leader with a mandate to run the party through the parliamentary election.
Park faces an uphill battle to win the election. The odds are stacked heavily against the unpopular party. To win the election, she needs to regain the public’s confidence in the party.
To restore confidence, the party should reach out to the electorate by showing genuine concern for the improvement of their livelihoods.
But there is one important thing that Park should do before presenting policies aimed at winning the hearts and minds of the voters. She needs to maintain party unity and ensure that no ugly power struggle erupts among the party’s diverse groups.
For this, she has to put an end to factional politics within the ruling party. In this regard, she suggested during a general meeting of the GNP lawmakers Thursday that she would dissolve her own faction.
She was also quoted as saying during her meeting with the reformist lawmakers that “To me, there is no such thing as a pro-Lee Myung-bak or pro-Park Geun-hye faction.”
Whether or not she is really committed to ending factionalism will be revealed soon through the steps she takes to reshape the party.
