The People Power Party sharply criticized President Lee Jae-myung's nomination of Democratic Party lawmaker Park Hong-keun as Minister of the Ministry of Planning and Budget, calling it a "revolving-door appointment that abandons fiscal soundness."
"The national budget is not a 'storehouse' to support popular policies but the last bastion for designing the nation's sustainability," chief spokesperson Park Sung-hoon said in a statement Monday. "Its head must be evaluated on cool-headed policy judgment and fiscal expertise, not political symbolism."
Park pointed to "the Lee Jae-myung administration's expansionary fiscal policy and large-scale national projects already announced," warning that "appointing a core ruling party figure as 'guardian of the national coffers' raises serious concerns about exposing state finances to unlimited political populism."
"Above all, nominee Park was included today among the six candidates in the Democratic Party's Seoul mayoral primary," he added. "The fact that he was nominated as budget minister before the ink on the candidate announcement had even dried can only be seen as the Blue House intervening in the election to clear the field."
The opposition pledged to "thoroughly verify each nominee's expertise, morality, qualifications, and capabilities to determine whether they meet the public's standards" regarding the Lee administration's cabinet appointments, which he said lacked "philosophy or criteria."
"The Lee Jae-myung administration should not dismiss opposition criticism as obstruction but should adopt an open attitude that listens to reasonable concerns," Park added.
Park Hong-keun, nominated as the first Minister of Planning and Budget, is a four-term senior lawmaker who served as Democratic Party floor leader in the 21st National Assembly.