Political parties woo voters ahead of April general election

With just a month to go before the general election, Korea's two main political parties are neck-and-neck in surveys as they roll out new pledges to win key districts that will determine who controls the National Assembly.

A sign at the Yeongtong District Election Commission office in Suwon, Gyeonggi, shows there are 30 days remaining before the April 10 general election as commission officials inspect ballot boxes. [YONHAP]

With just a month to go before a general election that will shape President Yoon Suk Yeol’s remaining three years in office, Korea’s two main political parties are neck-and-neck in surveys as they roll out new pledges to win key districts that will determine who controls the National Assembly.

The upcoming April 10 election is a chance for the conservative People Power Party (PPP), which is aligned with the Yoon administration, to wrest control of the legislature from its liberal rival, the Democratic Party (DP), which has frequently clashed with the president and will likewise seek to maintain its parliamentary majority to rein in the government.

The election’s approach coincides with a recent rise in Yoon’s approval rating, which came in at 40.2 percent in a Realmeter survey released on Monday.

Since taking office in May 2022, the president’s approval rating usually hovered below 40 and even 30 percent in public opinion surveys. Observers have attributed the recent uptick to popular support for the government’s proposal to expand medical recruitment despite a mass walkout by junior doctors opposed to the plan.

Support for the two main political parties also appears to be in flux, according to recent surveys.

In a Realmeter survey of 1,006 adults aged 18 and over that was conducted from March 7 to 8, 41.9 percent of respondents said they support the PPP compared to 43.1 percent who said they plan to vote for the DP in the upcoming election.

That opinion poll contrasted sharply with an earlier joint survey by Yonhap News Agency and Yonhap News TV, which showed 33 percent support for the PPP and 26 percent support for the DP.

Factional divisions within the DP have burst into open view the past few weeks, with some members arguing that its candidate nomination process is intended to sideline lawmakers who are not aligned with leader Lee Jae-myung.

But even as DP lawmakers disgruntled with the party’s internal strife and leadership defected to the conservative bloc, PPP interim leader Han Dong-hoon warned that the party still trails behind its rival.

Both parties have unveiled election pledges targeting the country’s most urgent challenges, such as its rock-bottom birth rate.

The PPP’s policies focus on creating better working conditions for parents with children, including a new child care leave policy entitling workers to up to five days of paid annual leave to care for a sick child. The DP has proposed more subsidies and advantages for couples to have babies, such as free public housing for families with two or more children.

Both parties also laid out urban renewal plans that include burying aboveground railways so that the land they currently take up can be used for other purposes, despite criticism that such proposals amount to pork barrel spending pledges.

In the event that neither party gains an outright majority in the election, the newly formed splinter parties — such as the Korea Innovation Party led by disgraced justice minister Cho Kuk — or a merger of like-minded parties could play an outsized role in determining control of the National Assembly.

The New Reform Party, led by former PPP leader Lee Jun-seok, joined forces with the New Future Party, led by former prime minister and ex-DP leader Lee Nak-yon, on Feb. 9, only to separate less than two weeks later after their leaders disagreed on how to share power.

While a total of 300 seats are up for grabs in the general election, with 254 directly elected and the remaining 46 to be filled by party list proportional representation, the most fiercely contested areas in Korea’s regionally divided electoral landscape are likely to be Seoul’s 48 constituencies.

Whereas the Gangwon and Gyeongsang regions of the country have traditionally supported conservatives and the Jeolla region has consistently backed liberals, the direction of the vote in Seoul has mirrored public opinion in the past two general elections held in 2016 and 2020.

The party that won the majority of Seoul’s constituencies in those elections — the DP — also won the most seats in the National Assembly.

Candidate registration is scheduled to take place on March 21 and 22, with election campaigning allowed from March 28 until April 9. Campaigning is forbidden on election day itself.

Overseas voting is scheduled to take place from March 27 to April 1, while early voting will take place on April 5 and 6.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]