“Hopes and Fears" for Yoon Suk-yeol's Victory” (Part 1)
(To be continued in Part 2)
I would like to share the insights of Mr. Mr. Masatoshi Muto, former Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the Republic of Korea.
His theme is “Hopes and Fears" for Yoon Suk-yeol's Victory in the South Korean Presidential Election”, carried in Diamond Online dated March 11.
1. Two reasons why the presidential election in South Korea was a close race.
On March 9, South Korea's presidential election was held, and Yoon Suk-yeol, the candidate of the People Power Party, the largest opposition party, won 48.56% of the vote, 0.73% more than Lee Jae-Myung, who received 47.83% of the vote to become the 20th president of South Korea.
This marked the transition from an innovative administration under President Moon Jae-in to a conservative administration.
The presidential election was expected to be a close race, with some observers predicting a 3-5% margin of victory for Yoon Suk-yeol and a 1% margin of victory for Lee Jae-Myung.
However, the result was Yoon Suk-yeol's victory with a 0.73% vote margin.
The difference of only about 247,000 votes was less than that of Kim Dae-jung (about 390,500 votes), who was elected with the lowest vote difference ever, and the smallest vote difference in history.
The following two points can be cited as the reasons for such a close race.
First, the voter turnout was not very high. ........................
