South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol has been banned from leaving the country and is under formal investigation for treason following last week’s failed martial law exercise. But he remains in office, confusing analysts and diplomats who wonder who runs the country.

Ruling party lawmakers boycotted a vote on Yoon’s impeachment on Saturday, keeping him in office. Party leaders have insisted he will step back from his duties while his resignation is negotiated, opening the door to confusion and fears of a power vacuum.

When asked by the Financial Times who governs South Korea, a spokesman for the president said: “There is no official answer to this question.”

“Nobody knows who runs the military, and not even the president’s office can say who runs the country,” said Karl Friedhoff, an expert on Korean politics at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. “This is the exact opposite of an orderly transition.”

The chairman of Yoon’s ruling conservative People Power Party, Han Dong-hoon, and Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, a Yoon appointee and career technocrat, announced on Sunday that Yoon “will not be involved in the management of state affairs, including diplomacy How his own will be included The cabinet tried to negotiate an “orderly exit”.

Legal scholars have questioned the constitutional basis for Yoon’s apparent agreement to transfer presidential powers to his party and Cabinet. Investors are worried about the leadership of Asia’s fourth-largest economy, while foreign diplomats question who has authority over South Korea’s armed forces at a time of heightened tensions with Pyongyang.

Kim Seon-taek, a law professor at Korea University, said there is no basis in the constitution for the president’s powers to be officially transferred to someone else unless the president is permanently incapacitated or the National Assembly is impeached decided.

“Nobody listens to him, but legally he is still the president,” Kim said. “He is still the final decision-maker in state affairs and nothing can be done without his signature. “It is a very volatile and uncertain situation.”

In South Korea, presidential immunity does not apply in cases involving allegations of treason or rebellion. However, some legal scholars argue that the constitution could allow Yoon to remain in office even if he were arrested and imprisoned.

Neither the prime minister nor the party leader had the legal authority to exercise the president’s powers on his behalf, Friedhoff said, describing the situation as a farce.

Particularly troubling for many observers is the question of who is in command of South Korea’s armed forces, both for fears that Yoon might make a second attempt to impose martial law and for questions about whether South Korea will be able to respond in that case to a North Korean one Provocation.

“This is a dangerous situation, especially considering the security environment on the Korean peninsula,” a European diplomat said.

Several senior army officers have publicly stated that they would refuse to comply with an order from Yoon to impose martial law a second time. But South Korea’s defense ministry confirmed to reporters on Monday that Yoon remained the country’s commander-in-chief.

“The Joint Chiefs of Staff have stated that they will make their own judgment as to whether the situation is necessary for them to follow Yoon’s orders or not,” Korea University’s Kim said. “This is a really strange situation.”

A former senior officer in the South Korean armed forces told the FT that in practice he doubted that “a South Korean officer would obey or even listen to the president’s orders.” “They will take orders from the prime minister,” the retired official said. “It’s not an ideal situation, but the chain of command is intact.”

South Korea also has no defense minister after Kim Yong-hyun resigned following last week’s dramatic events. The prime minister has nominated South Korea’s ambassador to Saudi Arabia as Kim’s successor, but the president has yet to approve his appointment.

“It would be deeply concerning if an inter-Korean crisis were to erupt while we are still in this political chaos in Seoul – and such crises are not that rare,” said Andrew Gilholm, China and Korea analysis director at Control Risks, a geopolitical risk consultancy .

Some investors are worried about the impact of ongoing political unrest on the South Korean economy at a time when Korean exporters must prepare for the impact of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s protectionist trade policies. So far, markets have been supported by the government’s promise to intervene against “excessive” movements.

A senior South Korean economic official told the FT that “the country’s economic leadership is very secure” in the hands of Finance Minister Choi Sang-mok, who is also deputy prime minister. “There were no disruptions in economic decision-making.”

Analysts said the PPP leadership appeared to be hoping that delaying Yoon’s departure by several months would improve its chances in a future election. Opposition leader Lee Jae-myung, the leading contender to succeed Yoon as president, was indicted this year for his alleged role in a scheme to siphon millions of dollars into North Korea through a South Korean underwear maker. The case has yet to go to trial and Lee has denied any wrongdoing.

A former official in Yoon’s presidential administration said growing public anger over the PPP’s role in keeping Yoon in office had caused “panic” within the party’s parliamentary caucus.

For an impeachment motion to be passed, two-thirds of the 300 members of Parliament must agree to it. Opposition parties need just eight of the PPP’s 108 lawmakers to support Yoon’s impeachment in a new vote expected to take place on Saturday.

On Tuesday afternoon, 22 PPP members voted to appoint a special investigator to investigate the martial law episode.

“There has been a backlash within the party against the leadership’s plan, which is not seen as making legal sense,” the former Yoon official said. “As a result, more and more people are thinking about supporting impeachment as the only way out.”