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| Former lawmakers of the now-disbanded Unified Progressive Party, including former floor leader Oh Byung-yun, left, announce their position in front of the Supreme Court in Seoul, Thursday, after the court rejected their request to restore their National Assembly seats. Yonhap |
By Jun Ji-hye
The Supreme Court refused a request from five former lawmakers, who belonged to the now-disbanded leftist Unified Progressive Party (UPP), to restore their status as lawmakers, Thursday, upholding an appellate court's ruling issued five years ago.
The top court said it was a "logical consequence" to strip the five lawmakers of their seats, as it was required to exclude members of the party from National Assembly activities after the Constitutional Court decided on the disbandment of the party.
"The consequence accords with the idea of democracy," the court said in its verdict.
In December 2014, the Constitutional Court made an unprecedented decision to disband the left-wing UPP and strip the party's five lawmakers of their seats. The decision was made while conservative President Park Geun-hye was in power, and Hwang Kyo-ahn, the former chairman of the conservative main opposition United Future Party, now the People Power Party, was serving as the justice minister.
Among the five lawmakers was Lee Seok-ki who had been convicted of instigating a rebellion to overthrow the state.
At the time, the Constitutional Court said the UPP was organizing activities with the hidden goal of creating a communist country like North Korea, noting that it had to strip the party's five lawmakers of their seats to "secure the effectiveness of the disbanding of the party," although it was not expressly stipulated in relevant laws whether lawmakers of a party ordered to be disbanded should be stripped of their seats.
Following the decision, the UPP lawmakers, including then floor leader Oh Byung-yun and Kim Jae-yeon, filed a lawsuit against the state in January 2015, claiming that the Constitutional Court stripped them of their seats without a legal basis and demanding their status be restored.
A local court dismissed their lawsuit, saying the decision to strip them of the Assembly seats was made by the Constitutional Court that has the ultimate authority to interpret and apply the Constitution.
They appealed but an appellate court ruled against the lawmakers, saying their seats had to be removed as a result of the order to disband the party. At the time, the court separately dismissed a similar request from Lee Seok-ki, saying he had been convicted and thus already lost his Assembly seat in accordance with the National Assembly Act.
When upholding the appellate court's ruling, the Supreme Court said, however, that it would be more appropriate to expressly stipulate in laws whether lawmakers of a party ordered to be disbanded should be stripped of their seats.
Following the ruling, the party's former floor leader Oh said, "We can no longer let the judiciary suppress the people. We will continue to protest the decision."
