A group of 13 junior lawmakers from the governing Grand National Party (GNP) called for a reshuffle of the government, Cheong Wa Dae and the party, Monday, following a crushing defeat in by-elections last Wednesday.
The self-proclaimed reformists, who were first elected to the National Assembly in the general election in April last year, also called for a national convention in the near future to elect new leaders.
They also urged party leaders to take steps to resolve the factional feud between aides of President Lee Myung-bak and followers of former party …

National’s candidate for the Mt Albert by-election says she has a chance of winning the seat and will be helped by vote-splitting between Labour and the Greens.
List MP Melissa Lee last night beat Ravi Musuku for the nomination.
Ms Lee said today Labour had held Mt Albert for 63 years and Miss Clark served it well, but there were four new candidates in the by-election.
“Mt Albert voters are spoilt for choice,” she said on Radio New Zealand.
“It will be fantastic to get into an electorate and represent the people there.”

The fight to win the Mt Albert electorate is heating up with both major parties now having selected candidates to contest the seat in next month’s by-election.
The National Party on Monday night confirmed Korean born former TV presenter and current list MP Melissa Lee to take on Labour’s candidate David Shearer.
Lee is confident she stands a chance in the Labour stronghold that was held by former prime minister Helen Clark for 27 years.

KUALA TERENGGANU: Deputy Home Minister Senator Datuk Wan Ahmad Farid Wan Salleh said the police have assured him that the voters of the Kuala Terengganu parliamentary constituency would be able to exercise their right without any fear in the upcoming by-election.
Wan Ahmad Farid, who is the Barisan Nasional (BN) candidate for the by-election scheduled for Jan 17, said the police were already putting up temporary kiosks in strategic areas of the constituency to monitor the situation to ensure there would be no untoward incidents.

One of the factors that seems to have helped persuade the people of Glenrothes to choose Lindsay Roy as their MP was the knowledge that, until recently, he never wanted the job in the first place.
Roy, 59, was a career headteacher. He had been teaching in Fife for almost 40 years and, until this year, he had never stood for election as a politician.