"New Party Name" vs "No Discussion"... Rising Tensions Ahead of Lee-An's First Meeting

Lee Jun-seok and Ahn Cheol-soo, First Meeting Since 2018

Lee Jun-seok, the leader of the People Power Party, is giving a greeting speech at the party members' meeting held at the National Assembly on the 14th. [Image source=Yonhap News]

Lee Jun-seok, leader of the People Power Party, will hold his first official meeting with Ahn Cheol-soo, leader of the People’s Party, since taking office. During this meeting, the two leaders are expected to enter into full-scale discussions to promote a merger.

Lee plans to visit Ahn at 3 p.m. on the 16th as a courtesy call following his inauguration. This will be the first official meeting between Lee and Ahn since 2018, when they gathered with former lawmaker Yoo Seung-min at the 'Youth is the Future' talk concert during the merger talks between the People’s Party and the Bareun Party.

The two leaders are anticipated to continue discussions on the merger of their parties during this meeting. Lee stated on the previous day’s YTN radio program 'Hwang Bo-seon’s Starting Morning,' “I plan to visit Leader Ahn tomorrow (the 16th),” adding, “I think there will be more official discussions regarding the integration at that time.” Earlier, the two leaders reportedly exchanged positive views about the merger during a meeting at a caf? in Sanggye-dong, Nowon-gu on the 12th.

However, the two parties appear to be engaged in ongoing tensions ahead of the merger push. On the same day, Kwon Eun-hee, floor leader of the People’s Party, repeatedly emphasized on YTN radio 'Hwang Bo-seon’s Starting Morning' that the new party name must be changed upon merger. Kwon said, “Moving forward with a new party name aligns with a principled approach to the merger,” adding, “Since both the People Power Party and the People’s Party include the word ‘People’ in their names, it is not a difficult situation.” She also expressed a pessimistic outlook, saying, “Because Leader Lee does not share the basic understanding with the People’s Party at all, it will be difficult to see tangible results within this month.”

The day before, Leader Ahn also issued a statement to the media, warning that “the People Power Party must show more sacrifice and dedication by relinquishing vested interests.”

However, the People Power Party responded that such claims had not been discussed. A representative from the People Power Party said, “This has never been discussed,” and added, “We intend to proceed with the plan prepared by former floor leader Joo Ho-young.” Regarding the People’s Party’s claims, the representative criticized, “Stirring public opinion before merger discussions begin will not work to their advantage.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.