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Jang Dong-hyuk, the leader of the opposition People Power Party, attends a party Supreme Council meeting on Feb. 19, 2026. (Yonhap)

Despite last week’s court ruling finding former President Yoon Suk-yeol guilty of insurrection and sentencing him to life imprisonment, the conservative People Power Party (PPP) to which he belonged has yet to issue any formal statement on the matter. 
 
From the get-go, the PPP vehemently opposed Yoon’s impeachment and subsequent arrest, earning the party the wrath of the public, who punished the it at the ballot box in last June’s presidential election. Even after its defeat, the party has refused to admit that Yoon’s 2024 martial law declaration constituted an attempt at insurrection, with its leader Jang Dong-hyuk claiming that it should “wait for the judiciary’s decision.”
 
Instead of cutting all ties with those involved in this failed self-coup, the party is busy attempting to cater to the desires of those affiliated with the “Yoon Again” movement that praises the disgraced former president and his martial law gambit, and would see him return to power.

After a Seoul court handed Yoon a life sentence, the party delayed the release of its leader’s official statement, saying that a message would be released “after reviewing various opinions.”
 
The majority of the Korean public knows what it wants from the PPP: as the ruling party during the time of a crisis that trampled on the Constitution, it should issue a clear apology and disavow those who were a part of, or praised, the insurrection. The fact that the PPP continues to hem and haw in response to this supremely reasonable request is shameful. 
 
The disgraceful state that the PPP finds itself in makes us believe that it will be virtually impossible for it to break with the insurrectionary forces any time soon. Even before the court issued its sentence for Yoon, Kim Min-soo, a member of the PPP Supreme Council, called for an “objective review” that would “determine whether any unwarranted legal decisions were made or if political biases were included when the grave label of ‘insurrection’ was applied.” 

Cho Kwang-han, another member of the party leadership council, added, “Some branches of the judicial system are emoting excessively to mark people with scarlet letters.”
 
So thoroughly do these people refuse to acknowledge that a court found their former president to be guilty of insurrection that they could be given all the time in the world and they still would never be able to muster the reasonable response that the public expects. 
 
Jang commented on Wednesday that rather than focusing on cutting ties with Yoon, the party “ought to focus on transitioning.” 

“The PPP needs to adopt new strategies and agendas,” he said. 

Instead of completely distancing itself from insurrectionists, the party is resorting to distractions, such as changing its name and criticizing the current administration, to try to dig itself out of its hole before the local elections in June.
 
But how does it expect to win back public trust on anything if it can’t manage to address the most pressing issue of our time — overcoming the insurrection — and instead tries to change its name and move on? If it keeps up this act, the PPP won’t be able to avoid intense public scrutiny. 

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