Ruling Party Backs Korea Reforms : Roh, Resignation in Hand, Presents Proposals to Chun

Armed with the full support of the ruling party’s lawmakers, Chairman Roh Tae Woo this morning took his bombshell proposals for political reform in South Korea to President Chun Doo Hwan.

The party chairman, according to government radio, arrived at the meeting carrying both his letter of resignation and the reform package.

In a surprise national television address Monday morning announcing the reforms, Roh had vowed to resign as chairman and presidential candidate of the ruling Democratic Justice Party and to retire from public life if his proposals were not accepted by Chun and the party rank and file. With the pledged support of the party, only Chun’s response was awaited.

Chun Expected to Accept

According to the government-owned Korean Broadcasting System report, however, Chun is expected to accept all elements of the reform package, which the opposition said Monday met its major political demands, including a call for direct presidential elections. The radio report said the president will announce his decision Wednesday morning in a nationwide broadcast.

In a caucus convened after Roh’s surprise Monday announcement to the party’s executive council, its bloc of legislators in the National Assembly adopted a resolution of full backing for the sweeping program for democratic reform.

Roh’s position was further strengthened when the 28 members of the executive council voluntarily offered their resignations. “We have decided to tender our resignations to give Chairman Roh a free hand in restructuring the party,” party spokesman Kim Jung Nam said.

Proposal a Surprise

Just three days after another outburst of anti-government demonstrations had rocked the country and left the capital swamped in police tear gas, Roh (pronounced Noh by Koreans), a 54-year-old former general, turned politics on its head here by proposing his series of reforms. They came as a surprise to both his party brethren and the opposition.

“Chairman Roh’s statement covered our most important demands,” opposition leader Kim Young Sam told an afternoon press conference.

After meeting Roh this morning, the goverment radio report said, Chun discussed implementation of the proposals over lunch with Prime Minister Lee Han Key, the justice minister and the Speaker of the National Assembly.

Later this afternoon, he was scheduled to discuss the reforms in an emergency Cabinet meeting.

On a visit to a patriotic shrine outside Seoul on Monday after dropping his bombshell, Roh told reporters, “I don’t think the President will oppose it,” suggesting that he had not discussed his proposals with Chun before announcing them.

“I thought I was made responsible for solving political problems when President Chun told the (opposition) leaders that he would not involve himself in domestic politics,” Roh explained. “So I worked on ways to solve the problems.”

No Room for Refusal

Political analysts, diplomats and even opposition leaders saw virtually no political room for Chun to reject the reform program, even if he wanted to. While declaring that he was taking a wait-and-see attitude, Kim Young Sam said Roh “probably had some sort of political consent from President Chun.”

“I trust what Roh Tae Woo said, and I would like to believe President Chun will accept this, and he should accept it.”

Kim was quick to claim the political turnaround--which he called “welcome . . . but a bit late”--as a victory for the South Korean people and, by inference, for his opposition Reunification Democratic Party.

“This was the people’s victory,” he said. “We should give all credit to the people.”

High-Level Talks Expected

Once the program is endorsed by Chun, Kim said, high-level staff members of his party will meet with their counterparts in the ruling party to work out procedures to revise the constitution and laws to effect the changes recommended by Roh. Kim said that he would also push for new National Assembly elections to be held concurrently with the presidential election, sometime in late October or early November.

Chun, who seized power in a 1980 coup, has pledged to leave office when his term expires next February.

Kim declined to say whether he would run for the presidency, but he declared that the opposition parties would put up just one candidate to avoid splitting their strength, and he said the candidate would come from his Reunification Democratic Party.

Peaceful Olympics Predicted

Roh’s move to defuse the explosive political confrontation here will also assure a peaceful atmosphere for Seoul’s 1988 Summer Olympic Games, Kim predicted.

“Once President Chun accepts the proposals and we have a new government in power,” he said, “then we won’t have any more problems, and we won’t have any more demonstrations. We will, I’m sure, have a successful Olympic Games.”

Kim said that he had discussed Roh’s program with his opposition colleague, Kim Dae Jung. “We not only welcome it, we enthusiastically welcome it,” Kim Young Sam said.

No Interest in Presidency

Kim Dae Jung agreed and suggested that a bipartisan Cabinet be installed to help govern the country until Chun’s term ends in February. Kim, released from 2 1/2 months of house arrest just last week, declared that he “is not interested in becoming president.”

“My objective is the realization of democratization in Korea, and I want to cooperate with the people for it,” he said.

The National Coalition for a Democratic Constitution, an opposition-backed alliance of religious and human rights groups that put pressure on the ruling party with street demonstrations on June 10 and last Friday, also welcomed what its spokesman called Roh’s “somewhat belated” reform package.

Roh outlined his proposals to ruling party executives in a Monday morning meeting broadcast live on nationwide television.

Backs Presidential Vote

Citing the “people’s will,” he endorsed the long-held opposition demand for direct presidential elections, though he said he still believes a parliamentary-Cabinet form of government is best suited for the country.

In meeting other key opposition demands, he called for amendments to the election law to assure free and fair electoral campaigns, the release of all political prisoners except those convicted of treason and violent crimes, and the restoration of Kim Dae Jung’s civil rights. Kim Dae Jung, convicted of masterminding the 1980 Kwangju insurrection, is under a suspended prison sentence that bars him from participation in politics.

The ruling party chairman also proposed:

-- Extension of habeas corpus provisions under constitutional revisions protecting human rights. His party, he said, “should hold periodical meetings with the lawyers associations and other human rights groups to promptly learn of and redress human rights violations.”

-- Promoting press freedom by revising or abolishing the press law. Among other strictures of the current law, Seoul newspapers are forbidden to station correspondents in the provinces, and editions are limited to 12 pages. “The government cannot control the press, nor should it attempt to do so,” Roh said.

Press Broadens Coverage

With the government under fire, the generally tame Seoul press has broadened its coverage and comment of political affairs since political turmoil erupted here June 10, observers say.

June 10 was the day of Roh’s nomination as the ruling party candidate in indirect presidential elections that seemed certain to assure the military-dominated party’s control of government for another seven years. If Roh’s reform package is approved, the opposition may be favored in the resulting direct elections, although Roh himself obviously picked up some popular support Monday with his unexpected reform proposals.

In an afternoon outing, the ruling party chairman visited a policeman injured in recent rioting and then paid at call at Yonsei University hospital on a student struck and critically injured by a police tear gas canister on June 8. The student, Lee Han Yol, is brain dead and surviving only on life-support systems, his doctors say. The case has become a rallying point for student demonstrators.

Visit Draws Applause

When Roh entered the hospital, according to press reports, he was applauded by other visitors who recognized him, an improbable response before he made his address Monday morning.

Also on Monday, the government delivered on its pledge to release the majority of demonstrators arrested in street protests since June 10. Prosecutors freed 219 of the 335 arrested demonstrators. Of the 219, 184 were college students. Those still detained either remain under investigation or stand accused of violent crimes.

Not released were 12 officials of the National Coalition for a Democratic Constitution, arrested after the June 10 demonstrations sponsored by that opposition alliance.