“The next presidential election is an election that we go to by defaulting to 5 percentage points.”
This is a term often heard among lawmakers from the Democratic Party of Korea. This means that Democratic Party presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung is absolutely at a disadvantage in terms of constituency as the real estate situation of the Moon Jae-in administration and public opinion about regime change due to the arrogance and monopoly of the huge ruling party account for a majority in various surveys. Rep. Han Jung-jin said, “The default for the presidential election is ‘Lee Jae-myung 40% vs. Yoon Seok-yeol 45%’.
Nevertheless, there is a lot of optimism within the party that “there is a sufficient chance of winning”. Democrats believe in two main points. ① Democratic Party candidate Lee Jae-myung has a comparative advantage over People’s Power candidate Yoon Seok-yeol in economic and policy capabilities, and ② it is highly likely that Yoon’s ‘spousal risk’ will be in full swing. Candidate Lee also said in an interview with Yonhap News TV on the 1st, “There is still plenty of time,” and was confident of the ‘Golden Cross’ that reversed candidate Yoon.
與 “Economics and people’s livelihood is Lee Jae-myung” Emphasis on character theory
The Democratic Party sees Lee’s character competitiveness as a driving force that can overcome the unfavorable public opinion (the theory of government judgment). In the MBC/Korea Research poll conducted from the 27th to the 28th of last month, 39.3% of the respondents and 26.9% of the candidates selected Lee when they asked ‘who is the best candidate to solve the task of economic growth and job creation?’ In a KBS/Korea Research opinion poll conducted on the 26th and 28th of last month, 52.4% of the respondents said, ‘If I become president, I will do well in managing the state’, while only 41.7% of Candidate Yoon.
A Democratic Party official said, “Conservative candidates often overwhelm progressive candidates in the evaluation of state management and economic capability, and this is an unusual result.” Even in the 2012 presidential election, the theory of regime change was not strong, but the ruling Saenuri Party candidate Park Geun-hye was elected with the advantage of character competitiveness. Candidate Park always ranked first in opinion polls asking the candidate’s competitiveness on economic issues at the time.
A passport official, however, said, “It is difficult to compare Candidate Park at the time and the current candidate Lee, who were able to boldly expand their boundaries such as economic democratization with overwhelming support from conservatives on their backs as a symbol of the ‘Park Chung-hee myth’.”
尹’s wife is expected to investigate allegations of ‘stock price manipulation’
On July 25, 2019, the then-new Prosecutor General Yoon Seok-yeol is waiting for President Moon Jae-in at the award ceremony held at the Chungmu Office of the main building of the Blue House. On the right is President Yoon’s wife, Kim Kun-hee. yunhap news
The Democratic Party is also watching the allegations surrounding Kim Kun-hee, the spouse of Candidate Yoon. Prosecutors are investigating the allegation that Kim acted as a ‘jeonju’ to pay for the manipulation of stock prices of Deutsche Motors Chairman Kwon Oh-soo. Recently, Chairman Kwon and related persons have been arrested and indicted one after another, and only the investigation into Mr. Kim remains.
The Democratic Party believes that if Mr. Kim is prosecuted, the value of ‘fairness’ that Yoon has been emphasizing against the Democratic Party’s image of ‘neighborhood’ could be destroyed. In a survey conducted by MBC and Korea Research on the 27th and 28th of last month, candidate Yoon (38.9%) was selected as ‘the best candidate for eradicating corruption’, and this candidate was 27.6%.
Be on the lookout for over-optimism
On the 28th, 101 days before the 20th presidential election, pictures of Lee Jae-myung, Democratic Party presidential candidate and Yoon Seok-yeol, People’s Strength presidential candidate, are hanging in a gallery in Jung-gu, Seoul. News 1
It is also pointed out that the Democrats are overly optimistic about this. Eom Gyeong-yeong, head of the Institute for the Spirit of the Ages, said, “In terms of generation, only those in their 40s show a clear advantage for this candidate. ·It will be difficult to break out of the ‘triple encirclement’ of the ideology.” A Democratic Party lawmaker also pointed out, “There is a perception of ‘who will vote for Yoon’ at the base of the optimism, but in reality, there is a lot more reaction that ‘anyone except the Democrats will shoot'”
Park Jun-seok reporter pjs@hankookilbo.com
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