A Seoul court will decide as early as Monday on a pretrial detention warrant for former main opposition Democratic Party(DP) leader Song Young-gil over alleged bribery to secure leadership victory at the 2021 party convention.

The Seoul Central District Court on Thursday scheduled the warrant hearing to start at 10 a.m. Monday, with senior judge Yoo Chang-hoon presiding.

It was Yoo who issued the same warrant for Kang Rae-gu, former standing auditor of the state-run Korea Water Resources Corporation and a key figure in the case, as well as for Song's former aide Park Yong-soo, while denying a warrant request for DP-turned-independent Rep. Lee Sung-man for his alleged role.

Prosecutors suspect that Song was involved in the distribution of 66-point-five million won, or around 51-thousand U.S. dollars, to DP lawmakers and regional party heads, with 20 cash envelopes containing three million won each distributed by DP-turned-independent Rep. Youn Kwan-suk.

Song is also suspected of creating an illegal political fund totaling 763 million won through an external sponsor group, 40 million of which was given as bribes from Park Yong-ha, the former head of the Yeosu Chamber of Commerce and Industry, in return for a business favor.