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Some analysts here interpret the parliamentary polls, which follow a major Cabinet reshuffle, as part of efforts to pave the way for the ailing leader to designate his successor.
Pyongyang's state-run KCNA news agency said Wednesday that the country will hold its first general election in more than five years on March 8, to elect deputies to its 12th Supreme People's Assembly, the country's legislative body.
North Korea missed the elections that were expected to have taken place by September 2008, when the assembly members' five-year term expired. South Korean officials and analysts said the delay in the key political event was caused as its "Dear Leader" Kim Jong Il suffered a stroke and underwent brain surgery in August.
The 66-year-old leader vanished from public view from Aug. 14 until Oct. 11, when the North's state media released the first photos of Kim's public activities in almost two months.
But the new photos of Kim inspecting a women's frontline military unit fueled speculation about his health because the pictures, which showed Kim healthy-looking and wearing sunglasses, seemed to have been taken months ahead of his purported illness, considering the color of the forest in the background.
In the face of the mounting rumors, the North has continuously released photos of Kim on his other public activities, mostly “on-site” inspection tours of industrial sites and military units. The flurry of media dispatches seems aimed at showing Kim's presence to North Koreans and quelling rumors that his health is poor.
Although the North has provided no video footage of Kim's activities yet, there is a consensus among North Korea watchers here that he is recovering enough to run the nuclear-armed country.
Seoul's Unification Minister Kim Ha-joong said he believed the North Korean leader has recovered enough to appear in public and his leadership is "stable." The ministry said the North's planned parliamentary polls show that its political process "has been normalized," with Kim Jong Il making a good recovery.
Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul, described the election notice as reflecting the fact that Kim has recovered his health enough to appear at the high-profile parliamentary session. "The notice also shows the North's ruling formula centered on Kim Jong Il has been fully normalized," he said.
Officials and analysts say the parliamentary elections will open up a new era for the leader, who inherited his power from his father, Kim Il Sung, following his 1994 death, in the first dynastic succession in a communist state.
The elections would be followed by the first session of the 12th-term Supreme People's Assembly most likely in April, which would be used to open Kim's third-term regime, they say.
Kim declared his second-term regime in 2003 with the first session of the previous 11th-term Assembly, which re-elected him as chairman of the powerful National Defense Commission.
Five years earlier, in 1998, when the 10th-term Assembly was launched, Kim's regime was formally inaugurated after years of official mourning for his father's death. At that time, the North amended its Constitution to make the NDC the country's highest decision-making body and abolish the office of state president, ushering in Kim's so-called "songun," or army-first, politics.
Since then, Kim has ruled the country in the capacity of NDC chairman, not as the general secretary of the socialist party, a variant from the traditional communist ruling formula.
Kim also used the 1998 parliamentary elections to pack the legislative chamber with younger loyalists, sidelining a group of aged officials installed by his father, in a generational shift to consolidate his leadership.
Many analysts say Kim may use the upcoming establishment of a new legislative body to create a political mood to handpick his successor, most likely among his three sons. The issue of who will be the successor has been the subject of intense interest due to Kim's poor health.
In a related move, Kim has recently conducted a major reshuffle in the economy-focused Cabinet, while replacing some senior officials in the Workers' Party and the military.
Kim has replaced at least nine ministers in the Cabinet, mostly in industry sectors such as metal, power, railways, trade, forestry and fisheries, according to Seoul's intelligence sources, in an apparent bid to boost the poor industrial sectors that are described in the North as the "backbone" of the economy.
With the lineup of the new Cabinet and new Parliament, Kim is expected to focus his efforts this year on rebuilding the country's battered economy, as mirrored in its New Year's message, analysts say. An economic recovery is necessary to create a festive mood for the rise of a crown prince, they say.
