South Korea's prime minister and top presidential officials offer to resign after election defeat
Seoul (AP/PTI): South Korea's prime minister and senior presidential officials offered to resign en masse on Thursday, after their conservative ruling party suffered a crushing defeat in parliamentary elections.
The results of Wednesday's elections were a huge political blow to President Yoon Suk Yeol, likely setting back his domestic agenda and leave him facing an intensifying political offensive by his liberal opponents during his remaining three years in office.
Prime Minster Han Duck-soo and all senior presidential advisers to Yoon, except those in charge of security issues, submitted their resignations, according to Yoon's office. It didn't immediately say whether Yoon accepted their resignations.
Executive power in South Korea is heavily concentrated in the president, but the prime minister is the No. 2 official and leads the country if the president becomes incapacitated.
Yoon said he will “humbly uphold” the public sentiments reflected in the election outcome and focus on improving people's economic situations and on reforming state affairs, according to his office.
In a separate news conference, ruling People Power Party leader Han Dong-hoon said he would step down as well to take responsibility for the election defeat.
With most of the votes counted, the main opposition Democratic Party and its satellite party appeared to have won a combined 175 seats in the 300-member National Assembly. Another small liberal opposition party was expected to win 12 seats under a proportional representation system, according to South Korean media tallies.
Yoon's ruling People Power Party and its satellite party were projected to have obtained 109 seats.
The final official results were expected later Thursday.
But the outcome means the liberal opposition forces will extend their control of the parliament, though they likely won't have the super majority of 200 seats that would give them the power to overturn vetoes and even impeach the president.
Wednesday's election was widely seen as a midterm confidence vote on Yoon, a former top prosecutor who took office in 2022 for a single five-year term.
He has pushed hard to boost cooperation with the US and Japan as a way to address a mix of tough security and economic challenges. But Yoon has been grappling with low approval ratings at home and a liberal opposition-controlled parliament that has limited his major policy platforms.
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Amethi to not have contender from Gandhi family for first time in 25 years
New Delhi (PTI): Uttar Pradesh's Amethi has long been synonymous with the Gandhis and it would be the first time in 25 years that a Gandhi family member will not be contesting election from the Lok Sabha seat.
Considered a citadel of the Gandhi family since its creation as a constituency in 1967, Amethi has been represented by a Gandhi family member for about 31 years since then.
The Congress fortress was breached in the last general election in 2019 when BJP's Smriti Irani beat Rahul Gandhi by more than 55,000 votes.
This time, Rahul Gandhi will contest the Lok Sabha election from the Rae Bareli seat, while Kishori Lal Sharma, a close aide of the Gandhi family, has been fielded from the Amethi Lok Sabha seat.
Sharma was the key person who looked after the two prestigious constituencies on behalf of the Gandhis.
The last time a non-Gandhi was in the fray from the constituency was in 1998, when Satish Sharma, a close aide of Rajiv Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi, contested the polls but lost to the BJP's Sanjaya Sinh.
Sonia Gandhi reclaimed the seat in 1999 routing Singh by over 3 lakh votes.
In 2004, Sonia shifted to the adjacent Rae Bareli constituency to make way for her son Rahul Gandhi.
Rahul won the constituency for three consecutive terms in 2004, 2009 and 2014.
Contesting for the fourth time in 2019, he lost to Smriti Irani, who hit the headlines as a 'giant killer'.
Amethi is one of the 80 parliamentary seats in Uttar Pradesh and comprises five assembly segments — Tiloi, Salon, Jagdishpur, Gauriganj, and Amethi.
Over the past few years, the Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party, and the Bahujan Samaj Party have emerged as the three main players in the constituency.
Its first Member of Parliament was Vidya Dhar Bajpai of the Congress who was elected in 1967 and held the seat in the next election in 1971.
In the 1977 election, Ravindra Pratap Singh of the Janata Party became an MP from the seat defeating former prime minister Indira Gandhi's younger son Sanjay Gandhi.
Sanjay Gandhi had his electoral revenge three years later when he defeated Singh in the 1980 general election.
Later that year, Sanjay Gandhi died in a plane crash and the seat fell vacant. In the consequent by-election held in 1981, Sanjay's brother Rajiv Gandhi scored a landslide victory from the seat, defeating his closest rival by more than 2 lakh votes.
Rajiv Gandhi went on to represent this constituency until 1991 when he was assassinated by the militant group LTTE.
The subsequent by-election held the same year was won by Satish Sharma, a close aide of Rajiv Gandhi and later Sonia Gandhi.
Sharma was re-elected in 1996 but lost to BJP's Sanjaya Sinh in 1998.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha Elections, Irani won the Amethi seat with a margin of over 55,000 votes, polling 4,68,514 votes. Rahul Gandhi got 4,13,394 votes.
In 2014, Rahul Gandhi won the Amethi seat for the third time in a row, polling 4,08,651 votes to Irani's 3,00,748 votes.
BSP candidate Dharmendra Pratap Singh came third with 57,716 votes and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) candidate Dr Kumar Vishwas was in fourth position with 25,527 votes.
The Amethi and Rae Bareli seats will go to polls on May 20 in the fifth of the seven-phase general election.
Ending days of suspense, the party announced the candidates from the two seats early Friday.
Deliberations had been on in the party since Thursday over the names of the contenders for the two seats.
The BJP had on Thursday announced Dinesh Pratap Singh as its candidate from Rae Bareli. He had lost to Sonia Gandhi in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
