President Yoon’s Cabinet Blindsided By Martial Law Decree
It looks like most of President Yoon’s cabinet had no idea about the martial law decree and he called them into a meeting that night just to consolidate them before declaring it:
A brief, five-minute Cabinet meeting took place between 10:17 p.m. and 10:22 p.m. in the presidential reception room, apparently without due process or any official record, according to data from the Ministry of Interior and Safety submitted by the presidential office.
Yoon, who came into the meeting but did not even sit down, abruptly left the meeting. At 10:23 p.m., he began reading his statement — without the presence of Cabinet members or reporters. The live televised address culminated in the declaration of martial law at around 10:28 p.m.
Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Song Mi-Kyung vividly recounted that some of those present at the five-minute Cabinet meeting on Dec. 3 were completely blindsided, leaving them powerless to intervene or stop him from making it public.
“(The president) briefly entered the room and then left. After he left, those who were seated were taken aback and asked, ‘Where did he go?’ At that moment, someone played a broadcast on their phone, and his voice came through. That’s what happened,” Song said during the Dec. 11 plenary session of the Assembly, recalling that the Cabinet meeting never formally concluded — there was no declaration signaling its end.
“It wasn’t even possible to grab hold of him or physically intervene in any way. I am truly sorry for this.”
You can read more at the link.
Sure, you can make that excuse for them. But few things you cannot change.
1) Many of them suddenly changed their cell phones after Dec 3, and they cannot explain satisfactorily why they did that.
2) Only 11 of them took the call to show up at the Parliament on the night of Dec 3 to vote against the Martial Law. On the other hand, all of the Democrat party members showed up, and fought off the military and the police to vote down Yoon’s declaration. Where were the rest of the PPP party members?
3) Only 3 of them voted for impeachment, in the first impeachment vote, the rest walked out without voting. This leads to the public’s belief that these people are supporting Yoon’s unconstitutional acts.
4) Only 11 of them voted for impeachment, in the second impeachment vote process, which succeeded in impeaching Yoon. This leads to the public’s confirmation that these people support Yoon to be the authoritarian power.
5) The same cabinet and the rightwing PPP party just did an internal witch hunt to find out who were those 11 members of the party that voted for the impeachment. They were called traitors to the party. This leads the Korean public to believe these people were actively helping Yoon’s treasonous moves.