Nearly half of races in capital, Gyeonggi and Incheon too close to call

This is the fifth in a series of articles on the April 11 general election. ― Ed.


Nearly half of the races in Seoul and its suburbs were seen as too close to call Thursday, just one week before the election on April 11.

With the ruling Saenuri Party and the main opposition Democratic United Party intensifying their mudslinging over an illegal surveillance scandal, the electorate appears unlikely to give either a clear-cut victory, experts said.

“In the capital area, there are so many battleground constituencies and the number is still rising, which makes it difficult to predict the poll’s outcome at this point,” said Kim Neung-gou, head of Wincom Communication, a political consultancy in Seoul.

The Greater Metropolitan Area, encompassing Seoul, Incheon and Gyeonggi Province, is undoubtedly the most crucial battleground in this election, representing 112 out of 246 electoral seats up for grab. Nearly half of the country’s population, or 23 million, resides in this area.

The region is considered relatively free from the country’s regionally biased voting pattern and thus a key barometer of public sentiment.

A few months ago, political pundits had predicted an easy opposition win in the region, citing widespread public discontent with President Lee Myung-bak and the ruling party.

While Saenuri Party chief Park Geun-hye managed to restore much of the popularity it had lost by introducing reforms and bringing in new blood, the opposition DUP stumbled in its early lead, with its candidate nomination process marred by a suicide and accusations of irregularities. They are now locked in a tight race, pundits said.

Recent opinion polls showed that in 58 of the 112 races the frontrunner and runner-up are less than 10 percentage points apart.

In about 28 constituencies, Saenuri Party candidates were found to hold a comfortable lead, while the DUP candidates were leading big in 24 others. The far-left minority Unified Progressive Party, which formed an alliance with the DUP, was seen holding a sizable lead in one precinct.

“In many hard-fought races, the winner may beat the runner-up by just around 1,000 votes,” Park Sun-sook, secretary general of the DUP, predicted.

In Seoul, where 48 seats are being contested, nearly 20 races were seen as a dead heat, with rivals within 5 percentage points apart.

Yet, the ruling party is seen holding onto its predominance in the so-called Gangnam Belt, the five up-scale residential districts south of Han River.

In one of the most high-profile races there, dubbed a duel between a champion and vocal critic of the Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement, Saenuri’s Kim Jong-hoon was leading the DUP’s Chung Dong-young by 46 percent to 37, according to a poll conducted by The Herald Business.

Kim served as Seoul’s chief negotiator during the FTA talks with the U.S., while Chung, considered a potential liberal presidential candidate, was at the vanguard of an effort to have it annulled.

In Songpa-B district, four-term DUP Rep. Chun Jung-bae is challenging Saenuri’s Yoo Il-ho, the current seat holder. Polls show Yoo beating Chung by around 10 percentage points in a hypothetical matchup. DUP officials, however, are hopeful that Park Ke-dong, a conservative bigwig running on the ticket of the Korea Vision Party, a newly established center-right party, could split conservative votes, heightening Chun’s chances to win.

In the past two general elections, the electorate of Incheon, city west of Seoul, had swung between the left and right, giving 9 out of 12 seats to the Uri Party, a precursor to the DUP, in 2004 and then in 2008 giving 10 to the Grand National Party, the precursor to the Saenuri Party.

This time around, however, experts say the two parties are likely to take about the same number of seats.

Saenuri candidates are leading in five constituencies, while the DUP are racing ahead in another five. In two remaining precincts, candidates are within 5 percentage points apart, polls show.

In 22 out of 52 constituencies in Gyeonggi, the rival parties are neck-and-neck. The two major parties each have a sizable lead in 15 races.

By Lee Sun-young (milaya@heraldcorp.com)