The Constitutional Court partially suspended a parliamentary committee's decision to bar Rep. Lee Jin-sook of the People Power Party from the National Assembly's annual audit of government agencies, drawing clashing responses from the rival parties. The People Power Party called the ruling "a stern warning against unilateral steamrolling backed by a legislative majority," while the Democratic Party of Korea said it "must not be stretched into a full lifting of the recusal."
People Power Party members of the Science, ICT, Broadcasting and Communications Committee issued a statement after the court ruling on the 21st, saying the decision "made clear that a legislative majority must not arbitrarily restrict the powers that the constitution and the law guarantee to lawmakers."
They added that "if even the parliamentary audit degenerates into a tool for blocking a particular lawmaker's participation based on political calculation, the oversight function and the public's right to know are seriously undermined," and stressed that "the Democratic Party must reflect on its unilateral decision-making backed by a legislative majority and take this ruling seriously." Lee, the lawmaker at the center of the dispute, wrote on Facebook that the ruling was "a self-evident decision by the Constitutional Court," adding, "I will take part in the audit tomorrow."
The court on the same day partially granted the injunction request filed by Lee, who had been excluded from the committee's audit. It found that barring her from the audit entirely was unjustified even if conflict-of-interest concerns existed. Lee will therefore be able to take part in the audit on some matters starting with the session on the 22nd. The suspension holds until the court rules on the underlying competence dispute case. The recusal remains in effect, however, for four matters, including work she handled while serving as chair of the Korea Communications Commission and cases in which she has been named in a criminal complaint.
Democratic Party members of the committee also issued an urgent statement offering their reading of the ruling. They said they "respect the court's decision," but added that its intent was that "audit participation must not be comprehensively restricted beyond the individual matters in which she has a stake, while the fairness of the audit must be preserved in matters where her own legal responsibility or conduct is at issue."
The Democratic Party committee members stressed in particular that "the court itself found there is considerable room to recognize grounds for recusal" on the four matters involving Lee. They went on to say that "Lee and the People Power Party must not stretch a partial suspension into a full lifting of the recusal," urging her to "refrain from taking part in the audit on matters where the recusal stands and to cooperate with the proceedings."