The ruling party's chairman said on Tuesday that his party will do its best to reflect public opinions in key state affairs and keep working closely with the administration of President Lee Myung-bak this year.
In his New Year's news conference, Ahn Sang-soo, chairman of the Grand National Party (GNP), also called for an early start of formal discussions on the Constitutional amendment.
"Our party will do its best to have the public opinion fully reflected in state management," Ahn said in the conference at the party's headquarters in Seoul.
"We had cooperated well with the government over the past three years and will actively do so in the future," he said.
Regarding the Constitutional revision, Ahn said the National Assembly must organize a special committee as early as possible to discuss the issue.
"Now, it is important to make a framework of dialogue to discuss not only the presidential system, but also the people's basic rights and the separation of legal, administrative and judicial powers, issues required to be addressed by the times," he said.
The GNP said last week that it will hold a plenary meeting of its lawmakers later this month to discuss a constitutional amendment to end the current five-year, single-term presidency restriction and divide power between the president and the prime minister.
The Constitution limits a president to a single five-year term to prevent long-term rule by one leader. Advocates of the revision say the limit creates a presidential "lame duck" syndrome in which the president's authority weakens in the latter half of the term as the power center shifts to the next administration. Many politicians have said a change is necessary, but the discussion has been postponed.
On welfare policy, Ahn vowed more efforts to improve the people's lives through "tailored welfare services for the working and middle class people" and create more jobs this year.
The chairman, however, criticized as "irresponsible" the main opposition Democratic Party's "universal welfare" policy for providing free school meals to all students and free childcare and medical services.
"The 'indiscriminative welfare' covering even the high-income class could bring a result that the wealthy benefit from taxes paid by the working class," he said.
The policy is "nothing but a populist strategy aimed to earn more votes in the upcoming parliamentary and presidential elections," he said. Both elections are slated for 2012.