November 24, 2025
SEOUL – The main opposition People Power Party has launched a campaign of outdoor rallies targeting the Lee administration, as the first anniversary of ousted President Yoon Suk Yeol’s martial law declaration approaches.
What the opposition presents as a nationwide tour to hear local concerns is, in practice, focused on amplifying criticism of the President Lee Jae Myung and boosting the party’s moribund support ratings.
But the timing of the campaign also appears designed to preempt the Democratic Party of Korea’s efforts to highlight the anniversary of the illegal martial law declaration by Yoon, who was elected president on the People Power Party’s ticket.
The tour, branded by the People Power Party as the “National Rally for Restoring Livelihoods and Defending the Rule of Law,” began Saturday and will run through Dec. 2, skipping the traditional liberal strongholds of North and South Jeolla provinces and Gwangju.
The campaign kicked off under the slogan “A Red Card Against the Lee Jae Myung Administration for Failing the People’s Livelihoods” in Busan and Ulsan, both in the traditional conservative stronghold of the southeast.
During the campaign stops, the People Power Party has focused on fallout from the prosecution’s November decision to abandon its appeal in the Daejang-dong land scandal case involving Lee as well as the Lee administration’s drive for judicial reform.
“The rule of law in the Republic of Korea is already dead. In the Republic of Korea, Lee Jae Myung himself has become the law,” Jang said Sunday afternoon at an outdoor rally in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province — the second day of the nationwide tour — referring to South Korea by its official name. “(Lee) is abolishing the Prosecutors’ Office simply because he cannot stand the sight ofprosecutors who investigated him.”
Jang further argued that the prosecution’s waiver of an appeal has made it impossible to recover the roughly 780 billion won ($530 million) in illicit gains initially sought for forfeiture in the Daejang-dong corruption scandal, leaving only the comparatively meager 47.3 billion won recognized by the lower court.
“The abandonment of the appeal, which put 780 billion won into the pockets of the Daejang-dong clique, is not an abandonment of the Republic of Korea. And it is an abandonment of the people.”
During the rallies, the People Power Party also has denounced Friday’s launch of the pan-governmental Task Force on Constitutional Compliance and Government Innovation. The task force is charged with investigating whether public officials across participated in the martial law scheme.
The Democratic Party issued a series of statements chastising the rallies over the weekend.
Democratic Party Chair Rep. Jung Chung-rae also continued to dimiss the demonstrations as evidence of the People Power Party’s continued collusion with Yoon.
“After seeing Yoon Suk Yeol reduced to such a pitiful figure in the televised trials, who would ever support pro-Yoon forces calling for ‘Yoon Again’?” Jung said Sunday on his official Facebook page.
Jung previously said Saturday “The People Power Party can’t bring itself to break with Yoon Suk-yeol, and is instead gradually making up its mind to break up with the public.”
Separately to the rallies, the People Power Party’s chief spokesperson Choi Bo-yoon on Sunday dismissed the launch of the pan-governmental task force as “political retribution.”
“The moment public officials, armed with armbands of authority, start recklessly branding their colleagues with a scarlet letter, the very core of government operations will collapse,” she said.
Baek Seung-ah, spokesperson for the Democratic Party’s floor leadership, said the investigation spearheaded by the task force is “not retribution; it is a procedure for defending the Constitution and restoring democracy.”
“This task force is the minimum procedure to determine the responsibility of public officials who either sided with the insurrection or abused their positions,” Baek said Saturday.