[Koo Bon-young Column] The broader opposition must ‘cut off Yoon’ but still keep his base

The broader opposition camp is in disarray ahead of the June 3 local elections. The People Power Party (PPP), the main conservative force, is in a state of disintegration. Polls keep sounding the alarm that the ruling party is headed for a landslide, yet the PPP is consumed by infighting over nominations for metropolitan mayors and governors. The house is collapsing, but only internal strife is growing louder. While the overwhelming ruling party majority is ramming through the Act on the Crime of Legal Distortion, the Constitutional Appeal Act, and the bill to increase the number of Supreme Court justices as part of the Three Judicial Laws, the opposition’s ability to check them is virtually nonexistent.
On the surface, the PPP’s internal conflict stems from differing views on how to deal with the support base of former president Yoon Suk Yeol. Non-mainstream figures such as former party leader Han Dong-hoon are calling for what they term “Jeol-yoon,” meaning a complete break with Yoon Suk Yeol and his circle. Oh Se-hoon, Mayor of Seoul, and Lee Jun-seok, leader of the Reform Party (RP) outside the PPP, have joined this push under the banner of election victory and opposition unity. By contrast, party leader Jang Dong-hyeok and the mainstream camp appear reluctant to sever ties with the so-called “Yoon Again” faction, fearing it would only deepen an already looming electoral disaster.
To be sure, the PPP leadership did declare a break with the former president on the 9th. In an emergency caucus, they adopted a resolution stating, “We clearly oppose any and all calls for the political return of former president Yoon.” Even so, the offensive from those pushing the “Jeol-yoon” line continues, led mainly by anti-Yoon forces. In effect, the target is not Yoon Suk Yeol, who was forced to leave the party, but Jang and the current leadership, who still enjoy support from pro-Yoon elements inside and outside the party. The aim is to pressure them to step back from the front line.
Even within the “Yoon Again” camp, few truly believe that Yoon Suk Yeol can regain power. After being impeached over his self-destructive emergency martial law gambit, he was sentenced to life imprisonment in his first trial. Without a special pardon, he cannot even return to ordinary civic life, let alone to the presidency. He is now in a position where he must await the grace of President Lee Jae Myung, his political rival, or of a future administration.
The “Jeol-yoon” battle is less a policy dispute over how to win the local elections than a struggle for hegemony within the opposition. The “Yoon Again” faction represents the hardline conservative base, perhaps 10% to as much as 20% of the overall electorate. Jang Dong-hyeok appears to believe that keeping them onside is the only way to avoid a total rout at the polls and to preserve his grip on the party afterward. Han Dong-hoon and others, on the other hand, likely hope to separate Jang from the “Yoon Again” camp, topple him, and emerge as the next standard-bearers of the opposition. But the public is not foolish. No matter who takes control of the opposition after the election, it is hard to imagine voters embracing someone steeped in defeatism as a viable presidential contender.
The bigger problem is that both sides are giving the impression that they have already written off the local elections. Some polls do show PPP support at roughly half that of the ruling party. But that outcome is by no means predetermined. The overwhelming ruling party majority is already poised not only to dominate the legislature and the administration, but to bring the judiciary firmly under its sway as well. The fallout is already visible. Consider the consequences of forcing through the Constitutional Complaint Act amid constitutional controversy. We are now seeing a spate of cases in which criminal offenders whose convictions have been finalized by the Supreme Court of Korea file constitutional complaints with the Constitutional Court of Korea, prolonging the suffering of victims. If the opposition loses even the minimal ability to provide checks and balances at the level of local government, it is obvious that ordinary citizens will bear the cost.
What, then, can prevent a catastrophic defeat for the conservative opposition? Initially, an electoral alliance for the local elections among the four aspiring opposition leaders—Jang Dong-hyeok, Han Dong-hoon, Oh Se-hoon, and Lee Jun-seok—offered the best leverage. In that sense, Jang’s camp made a mistake by expelling Han over the party’s online bulletin board issue, thereby narrowing that possibility. Han did give them an opening with an anti–Yoon Suk Yeol post made under a family member’s name, but still. Some now advise that, leaving Jang aside, Oh Se-hoon, Lee Jun-seok, and Han Dong-hoon should band together as a trio. Yet this is little more than factional political engineering. It is unlikely that centrist voters would suddenly flock to these three, and such a move could easily fracture the broader opposition and trigger a disastrous collapse in the local elections.
The cool-headed political thinker Niccolò Machiavelli once observed, “The only way to calm an angry populace is for a single outstanding and respected figure to appear before them.” This is a maxim the opposition, which has been alienated from public sentiment by Yoon Suk Yeol’s self-destructive martial law scheme, would do well to ponder. The problem is that the main players in today’s opposition—Jang, Han, Oh, and Lee—are, in terms of nationwide public trust, all more or less on the same modest level.
That is why all of them must now set aside personal ambition and adopt an attitude of putting the public interest before themselves. The “Yoon Again” debate over a comeback by Yoon Suk Yeol is a mirage, given that his chances are effectively zero. Even if each of them chooses to make their own separate push in this election, they must still seek judgment from voters on concrete alternatives to rein in the overwhelming ruling party majority and on credible visions for reforming people’s livelihoods. Only then can they at least avert mutual destruction across the broader opposition camp and have any hope of a political future for themselves after the local elections.
kby777@fnnews.com