[Editorial] No More Surprise Party in Appointing Prime Minister!!

The office of Prime Minister has remained empty for 56 days after the July 11 reshuffling. Congress has returned 8 documents to the administration, pointing that they lacked Premier’s endorsement. Even if President Kim appoints another Prime Minister in the near future, it is impossible to avoid another 20 more days of malfunctioning of the government. If the third nominator should be rejected by Congress, it could possibly happen that the presidential election and transition of administrations take place without a Prime Minister. Therefore, President should really be prudent in selecting another candidate Prime Minister this time.

President Kim should not stick to the “surprising appointment.” He failed with his choices of the first female Premier and a Prime Minister in 50s. Those two choices of President have no experience in day-to-day operation of the government and have serious ethics problems. Thus, the approval of them was rejected. The surprising appointment lacks demonstration of a candidate’s credentials over a long period of time. Thus, it carries higher risks of rejection. It is more serious since we could not rely on the screening ability of Blue House. Our government should no longer be a testing field.

Blue House may have problems in screening due to lack of time and technical limits. Then, it could minimize the risk by looking for candidates upon whom the public generally agrees. One of the ways is to pick out a senior citizen without political greed or a candidate proved of his/her administrative ability through long history as a government employee. It is also recommendable to discuss in advance with Grand National Party, which dominates the majority of Congress.

Blue House should also keep in mind the level of citizens’ standards in evaluating a Premier candidate, which has been raised going through two approval hearings. The public would accept the third candidate only when the third is at least more ethical than the previous two. Thus, President Kim should not look around him and try to pick up out of his henchmen. If a person is eligible, he should go and invite the candidate in person. If the candidate really intends to serve the country, he/she would not care about the remaining term.