Daughter of S. Korean former president elected new GNP chairperson

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, March 25, 2004

Daughter of S. Korean former president elected new GNP chairperson

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With the Grand National Party Of S. Korea caught up in crisis as a result of the post-impeachment backlash, the party selected 52-year-old Park Geun-hye, daughter of former president Park Chung-hee, to lead it into the April general election.

At an extraordinary party convention held Tuesday at Jamshil Students Stadium in Seoul, Park received 51.8 percent of the votes (2,614), easily beating second place finisher Hong Sa-duck, who finished with 28.8 percent (1,453). Park is the first woman to head an opposition party in 39 years; the last woman to do so was Park Sun-cheon, who was selected as head of the Democratic Party in 1965.

Kim Mun-su came in third with 12 percent (607 votes), Park Jin fourth with 4.2 percent (210 votes), and Kwon O-eul fifth with 3.2 percent (160 votes).

In her address, Park said, "The GNP is in a situation where rather than victory, it is worrying about its very survival ahead of the general election... In order to capture the attention of voters who are now shunning the GNP in anger, the party must change, and I will show them that these are changes are not merely words, but action."

Continuing, she said, "The GNP has two choices to make -- overcome this crisis and rise again, or be forever discarded by the people... I will make this a pragmatic party that supersedes ideas of conservative and progressive."

Park plans to put together an election committee Thursday and plunge into election preparation from then. There is much talk of making the head of the election committee a joint position shared by party heavyweights, younger party members, and outside notables. As way of apologizing to the citizens, the party will evacuate its W40 billion party headquarters in Seoul's Yeouido district and into tents set up in a 500-pyong area near Yeouido Park.

Source: agencies

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