The National Assembly vote on whether to impeach President Yoon Suk Yeol was left open for hours on Saturday, as 300 members of the parliament gathered for a rare weekend plenary session.

The bill to impeach Yoon was put to vote four days after South Korea watched in shock as armed soldiers broke into the Assembly grounds late Tuesday, about an hour after the president declared martial law.

In order to pass, the Democratic Party of Korea-led bill needed just eight votes from the ruling People Power Party, whose leader Han Dong-hoon had openly supported stripping Yoon of his presidential powers since Friday.

Not a single People Power Party member of the Assembly -- even longtime loyalists -- could defend what the president did. Open dismay came from several party elders and former leaders who denounced the president.

Han immediately called the president out and said he would “stand with the people and block martial law.”

But the decision to take Yoon down is still a hard one for the ruling party, which has a history of having one of its presidents, Park Geun-hye, impeached not long ago.

Two bills were up for a vote on Saturday, one for impeaching Yoon and the other for launching a special counsel investigation of the president’s wife Kim Keon Hee.

Up until the very last minute, the People Power Party held a series of meetings lasting hours each time, debating how members of the president’s party would decide on his impeachment.

At the end of the last meeting held right before the vote, the ruling party decided that they would stick to striking both bills down.

Han and a handful of lawmakers, branded the “pro-Han faction” within the ruling party, rallied to vote in favor of impeachment. Other moderate members of the party seemed to join in.

But the tide changed when Yoon extended a gesture of concession Saturday morning, apologizing to the people and saying he would let the ruling party and the government take charge of bringing the situation under control.

The president delivered the previously unplanned address at 10 a.m. Saturday, seven hours before the vote on his fate was set to take place.

At 5 p.m. probably one of the most highly watched plenary sessions of the Assembly began.

Inside the Assembly plenary chamber, some hundreds of meters away from the streets surrounding the parliament compound where, according to police, more than 50,000 gathered by the time the vote was about to begin, chants of “impeach! impeach!” could be heard.

Some Democratic Party and other opposition party lawmakers sat with signs that read “Jail the insurrectionist,” referring to the president, and “Vote against impeachment, and you are complicit,” in an apparent message to the People Power Party. A few of them walked over to the ruling party side of the chamber, waving the signs and shouting.

Minister of Justice Park Sung-jae, who read out the first lady investigation bill before the Assembly, could not be heard over angry yelling from opposition lawmakers. They shouted, “You colluded in the insurrection,” “Arrest the accomplice,” and “How dare you.”

The bill for a special counsel investigation of the first lady was voted on first.

Most ruling party lawmakers cast their ballots and then left, before the vote on the second bill for impeaching the president.

They were booed and shouted at by their opposition colleagues. “They were going to have Han Dong-hoon arrested. Don’t you think you could be next?” one was heard saying.

As Woo Won-shik, the speaker of the Assembly, announced the bill for investigating the first lady did not pass, shocked gasps could be heard from among opposition lawmakers.

The speaker noted that Rep. Ahn Cheol-soo, a former presidential candidate, was the only ruling party lawmaker who remained seated, before he gave the floor to Rep. Park Chan-dae, the floor leader of the Democratic Party.

“President Yoon, as the whole world watched, showed he was a threat to the democracy of this country,” Park said to a half-empty Assembly, urging lawmakers to vote to impeach the president.

The Democratic Party floor leader called out the names of 107 absent ruling party lawmakers one by one, urging them to return to the plenary chamber.

Reps. Kim Yea-ji and Kim Sang-wook were the two ruling party lawmakers to come back, drawing applause from the opposition lawmakers. The latter, who gave a tearful speech, said troops entering the Assembly was an “unforgivable violation of democracy” -- but that he voted against impeaching Yoon in line with his party.

When voting closed at 9:20 p.m. just three ruling party lawmakers had voted. The impeachment bill failed as less than two-thirds of the Assembly participated in the vote.

“I apologize to the South Korean people on behalf of the parliament. Failure to participate in voting on a matter like this is a failure to honor the process of democracy,” Woo, the speaker, said as he announced the final count.

Democratic Party lawmakers say they would introduce the impeachment bill against Yoon repeatedly until it passes.

“We are not going to stop until we get it passed,” Rep. Kim Yong-min told The Korea Herald.

Rep. Lee Hae-sik said Democratic Party lawmakers were trying to convince more from the People Power Party to join.

“We can make our case the best we can,” he told The Korea Herald.

Some among the People Power Party say consensus within the party is still forming.

Rep. Cho Kyung-tae, who is seen as a pro-Han within the ruling party, told The Korea Herald, “Change could come in time.”

At a rally held on the steps outside the plenary chamber, Rep. Lee Jae-myung vowed to impeach Yoon, “the worst threat facing Korea, no matter what it takes.”