The presidential office Cheong Wa Dae on Monday suppressed rising speculations within the ruling conservative Saenuri Party on the possibility of an impending constitutional revision.

While the party’s leadership has recently been raising the need for the amendment, President Park Geun-hye has suggested that it may raise political tension, especially amid ongoing national security and economic challenges, according to a top aide.

“It is our firm stance that this is not the right time to discuss constitutional revision,” Kim Jae-won, senior presidential secretary for political affairs, told Yonhap News Agency over the phone.

“Should the Saenuri continue to raise the issue, we may consider delivering a message (to the party), advising it not to do so.”

The top official’s remark signaled a toughened response from the Blue House, which is currently preoccupied with escalating military provocations from North Korea and the nation’s persisting slow economic growth.

In contrast, over the past month, spokesperson Jung Youn-kuk had merely reiterated that the presidential office’s view on the amendment “remained unchanged.” Such a passive tone was often taken as a gesture to shelve the legal issue until next year, in time for the year-end presidential election.

But it was National Assembly Speaker Chung Sye-kyun, along with a group of opposition lawmakers, who constantly pushed for the need to reform the Constitution. Their common stance is that the current basic law fails to properly reflect social and political changes since 1987, when it was last revised.

Adding to the pressure were the Saenuri’s leadership figures, including the party’s Chairman Rep. Lee Jung-hyun, who is deemed one of the closest confidants to the president.

“It is not time to legislate a lasting Constitution which is led by the people and which reflects the people’s opinion,” Lee said in a parliamentary representative speech last month.

His speech, though it did not elaborate further on the details of the revision, drew political circles’ attention as it came despite the president’s apparent reluctance toward the given agenda.

Backing the party’s chairman, floor leader Rep. Chung Jin-suk also alluded that the ruling camp may establish a special task force to lead the constitutional revision, once the ongoing state audit ends later this month.

Meanwhile, constitutional law professor-turned-lawmaker Rep. Chong Jong-sup recently canceled an impending seminar on the revision, boosting conjectures that the presidential house has already exerted pressure upon the party.

By Bae Hyun-jung (tellme@heraldcorp.com)