Cho Jeong-sik elected speaker of National Assembly, eyes constitutional reform

Six-term lawmaker Cho Jeong-sik of the Democratic Party has been elected speaker of the National Assembly for the latter half of the 22nd legislative session. Cho secured a decisive victory in the vote held during a plenary session on Thursday, garnering 267 votes out of the 276 lawmakers present.

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The latter half of the National Assembly will also continue to fulfill its mission as the last bastion of democracy without wavering.

As per parliamentary law, Cho will now lead the legislative branch as an independent, having formally left the Democratic Party. He first entered the National Assembly in 2004 and has been elected six consecutive times. Throughout his career, Cho has held significant positions within the Democratic Party, including secretary-general and policy committee chair, and has served as the chairperson of the National Assembly's Land, Infrastructure and Transport Committee. He was also appointed as a special political advisor to President Lee Jae-myung last December before resigning in March to run for the speaker position.

In his acceptance speech, Cho pledged to uphold the National Assembly's role as the "last bastion of democracy." He outlined plans to regularize plenary sessions, expand public participation, introduce future-oriented agendas, and systematize parliamentary diplomacy. Significantly, Cho highlighted the upcoming year as a "golden opportunity" to discuss constitutional reform, noting that 2025 marks the 40th anniversary of the current constitutional framework established in 1987. He pointed out that with no nationwide simultaneous elections scheduled for next year, it presents an ideal time for substantive constitutional amendment discussions.

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Next year marks the 40th anniversary of the 1987 constitutional system. It is time for the National Assembly to complete the homework that has long been postponed.

Cho proposed several areas for constitutional revision, including strengthening responsible governance through restructuring the power balance, incorporating the Bu-ma Protests and the May 18 Gwangju Democratization Movement into the constitution's preamble, enhancing parliamentary control over presidential emergency decrees, transferring the Board of Audit and Inspection to the National Assembly, and explicitly stating the principle of decentralization.

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Next year is a year without nationwide simultaneous elections, making it a golden opportunity to properly discuss constitutional amendments.