South Koreans Vote in Closely Fought Presidential Race

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota
Voters were choosing a successor to President Lee Myung-bak, who by law cannot seek a second term. The race pits the conservative governing party’s candidate, Park Geun-hye, 60, daughter of the late dictator Park Chung-hee, against her liberal rival Moon Jae-in, 59, a former human rights lawyer who was once imprisoned for opposing her father. With both campaigns having featured similar messages about a more inclusive economy and less tension with the North, the candidates were hoping to win over what appeared to be a large number of still-undecided voters, who polls have indicated want a new direction for the country but are disenchanted with the established parties.

Few analysts interviewed Wednesday were confident about predicting the outcome. "This is probably the most closely contested presidential election ever in South Korean history," said Choi Jin, head of the Institute of Presidential Leadership in Seoul. By midafternoon, turnout was higher than it had been at the same point in the past two presidential elections, according to the election authorities.

If elected, Ms. Park, a five-term lawmaker, would be the first female president of South Korea, which is still a male-dominant society despite the inroads women have made in corporate and government hierarchies in recent years. She would also be the first child of a past president to hold the office.

Ms. Park’s popularity is due in large part to her father, who remains a polarizing figure 33 years after his assassination by his disgruntled spy chief in 1979. Those who braved freezing weather in downtown Seoul to hear her speak on Tuesday, the last day of campaigning, were mostly people in their 50s and older, a generation that tends to harbor nostalgia for Park Chung-hee’s 18-year authoritarian rule, during which the South Korean economy skyrocketed.

"I have no family to take care of. I have no child to inherit my properties," Ms. Park, who has never married, said Tuesday. "You, the people, are my only family and to make you happy is the reason I do politics, and if elected, I would govern like a mother dedicated to her family."

Ms. Park’s most ardent critics, who form the basis of Mr. Moon’s support, are young voters whose disenchantment with the political establishment has deepened as their job opportunities have dwindled in recent years, even as the country’s politically connected conglomerates have made record profits. Another core group of Moon supporters is older voters who remember Park Chung-hee not as the overseer of economic revival, but as a ruthless dictator whose regime tortured dissidents and framed them as Communist subversives, and who banned such things as rock music and miniskirts. In the last years of her father’s rule, Ms. Park, whose mother was killed by another assassin’s bullet in 1974, effectively served as his first lady, and many of her progressive critics see her bid for the presidential Blue House as an attempt to turn the clock back.

"When I was living in poverty, she was living like a princess in the Blue House; when I was fighting dictatorship, she was at the very heart of it," Mr. Moon, who was chief of staff under President Lee’s liberal predecessor, Roh Moo-hyun, has said. "Her Saenuri Party is disqualified and unable to represent our nation. It must be replaced with a brand-new team."

Both candidates have promised to cut college tuition by half, spend more on welfare and provide small businesses with economic protection from the unpopular, family-controlled conglomerates known as chaebol. They have also said that President Lee’s hard-line policy on North Korea has failed and that they would attempt to engage the regime with both dialogue and aid.

Poll numbers released on Dec. 12, the last day new survey results could legally be published, indicated that Ms. Park was leading Mr. Moon by an average of about 2 percent, but they found Mr. Moon to be narrowing the gap. People in their 50s and older preferred Ms. Park, while Mr. Moon maintained a dominant lead among voters in their 20s and 30s. The country’s jobless rate for those 15 to 29 years old is more than double the national average of 3.1 percent.

Turnout has historically been stronger among older South Korean voters. Mr. Moon spent the last week exhorting young South Koreans to punish the government of Mr. Lee, which has recently been plagued by corruption scandals involving his relatives and former aides, by rejecting Ms. Park. He also stressed that the country’s conglomerate-dominated economic model, long credited for fueling growth but increasingly blamed for widening the gap between rich and poor, was established under Ms. Park’s father.

Still, Mr. Moon’s Democratic United Party, itself mired in political infighting, may be hard-pressed to characterize itself as anti-establishment among young voters who have expressed disdain for both established parties. Many young voters had enthusiastically supported another liberal candidate, Ahn Cheol-soo, a software mogul and university dean with no political experience, but Mr. Ahn withdrew from the race last month and backed Mr. Moon.

"This election will be decided by the voter turnout, by how many young people vote," said Kim Ji-yoon, a polling expert at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul.

View the original article here