The ruling party pushed ahead with the parliamentary review of next year’s budget on Thursday, despite the main opposition’s boycott of the National Assembly in its protest against the government’s reinstatement of government-issued textbooks.

The ruling Saenuri Party’s lawmakers unilaterally opened the Assembly’s budget committee to resume the 2016 review that had been stalled since the opposition boycotted the Assembly on Nov. 3. The law stipulates that the committee must finish the review by Nov. 30 and budget bill must be passed no later than Dec. 2.

But lawmakers of the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy refused to attend the session and continued their three-day boycott, though the party leadership appeared to be in a dilemma over the backlash to their parliamentary hold-up. 

“I don’t think we can resolve (the textbook) issue overnight. We cannot afford to invest ourselves only in the textbook issue. We also have to revive the nation’s weak economy and improve people’s livelihoods,” said NPAD chairman Rep. Moon Jae-in.

Moon also reiterated that the government rationale for rewriting history books is absurd, comparing it with an attempt to sympathize with North Korea.

“The government’s argument that South Korea was founded on Aug. 15, 1948, is against the Constitution. It is nothing but an attempt to deny South Korea’s legitimacy and orthodoxy and sympathize with the North,” said Moon, pointing out that North Korea claims that it was founded in 1948.

The NPAD asserted that South Korea was founded in 1945 because it is the only legitimate government that succeeded the Daehan Jeguk (1897-1910), the last empire of Korea, and the Korean provisional government during the 1910-1945 Japanese colonial era.

Other minor opposition blocs, such as the Justice Party, agreed to the need for a fresh approach. Justice Party chairman Rep. Shim Sang-Jung asserted that the liberal blocs should come up with a new plan for the escalating textbook controversy.

“We need to rebuild the coalition among opposition blocs,” Shim said in press conference Thursday. “The coalition should be expanded to address other issues, such as the ruling party’s attempt to push for labor reforms,” said Shim.

In an attempt to sway the voters by emphasizing on public livelihood, the Saenuri Party urged the NPAD to bring the Assembly back on track.

“Even though we are facing important issues related to people’s lives, the NPAD is walking away and derailing the parliamentary session. The NPAD is surely using this opportunity to overshadow its problems at home,” said Saenuri Party chairman Rep. Kim Moo-sung, referring to lingering factional feud at the rival camp.

The Saenuri Party’s move followed the government’s official announcement Tuesday that it would reinstate state-authored textbooks for middle and high schools and that it had started gathering a panel of history experts to author them.

The Saenuri lawmakers have demanded the NPAD stay away from the textbook issue and withdraw the parliamentary boycott, saying the NPAD should stop “politicizing” the education issue that is now relevant to policies of the administrative branch, not the legislative one.

By Yeo Jun-suk (jasonyeo@heraldcorp.com)