A special parliamentary committee tasked with holding confirmation hearings for the new prime minister nominee adopted a plan Tuesday with details of the upcoming evaluation process.
Lee Wan-koo, the then floor leader of the ruling Saenuri Party, was nominated by President Park Geun-hye last month in what is expected to be a small-scale Cabinet reshuffle aimed at regaining public confidence in the administration.
He is scheduled to undergo confirmation hearings at the National Assembly next Monday and Tuesday, after which a plenary session will be convened on Feb. 12 to put his nomination to a vote.
Under the committee’s plan, the first day of the hearings will start with Lee taking an oath, which will be followed by his opening remarks and questions from ruling and opposition party lawmakers on the panel.
The second day of the hearings will open with more questions from the committee members and end with a question and answer session with witnesses.
The committee has yet to agree on the list of witnesses and will continue talks on Wednesday morning to settle the issue, officials said.
It plans to adopt a report on the result of the hearings on Feb. 11.
The hearings are widely expected to focus on Lee’s alleged ethical lapses, including suspicions that he speculated in real estate, plagiarized his doctoral thesis and intentionally omitted parts of his annual wealth report.
Last week, Lee’s second son voluntarily underwent a medical exam in public to prove that he was legitimately exempted from mandatory military service. (Yonhap)
