Rep. Shin Jang-sik was elected Saturday as the new leader of the minor Rebuilding Korea Party, succeeding former Justice Minister Cho Kuk, who founded and led the party before stepping down last month after the June 3 local elections.

Shin, the only candidate at the party's national convention held Saturday at the Suwon Convention Center, won the leadership post with support from 96.7 percent of party members who voted.

The vote marked the first time the Rebuilding Korea Party had chosen a leader at a national convention since Cho was elected to the post in November 2025 following the party's establishment. Cho, a former law professor who served as justice minister under President Moon Jae-in, built his political profile around calls to curb the power of prosecutors, an issue that has been among the most divisive in South Korean politics in recent years.

Shin has said he will push a more assertive reform agenda than the ruling Democratic Party (DP), which is a political ally of the Rebuilding Korea Party. He has argued that his party should "broaden the playing field on the left."

He is expected to adopt a harder line than the DP on prosecutorial reform, including efforts to abolish prosecutors' supplementary investigative powers, which reform advocates argue concentrate too much authority in the prosecution service.

"We will remain vigilant until the moment the prosecutorial reform bill passes a plenary session of the National Assembly," Shin said.

Shin has also made strengthening the party one of his priorities and has rejected the possibility of the Rebuilding Korea Party being absorbed into the DP. The party's ability to build organizational capacity takes on added urgency given its empty electoral ledger: it currently holds no major executive posts or parliamentary seats after the June 3 contests.

The party is expected to review a possible name change. Its Korean name, Cho Kuk Hyukshin Party, contains the name of its founder, although "cho kuk" also means "homeland" in Korean.

Cho lost his bid for a parliamentary seat in the Pyeongtaek-B constituency in Gyeonggi Province in a by-election held alongside the June 3 local elections.

The Rebuilding Korea Party also failed to win any of the 16 major mayoral and gubernatorial posts, or any of the 14 parliamentary seats, contested in elections held that day.