The JoongAng Daily has a poll out on next week’s three by-elections and they are looking pretty interesting.
The most watched race is in Daejeon:
In Daejeon city, Sim Dae-pyung, founder of the People First Party, had 33.1 percent of the pollees’ support, while the Grand National candidate, Lee Jae-sun, had 31.4 percent.
As you may recall, the Uri Pddarty has decided to sit this one out and esentially backing the PFP in the hope of denying the seat to the GNP. A GNP loss here would certainly give some comfort to Uri party leaders and shake the GNP’s jaugernaut image some. As such, what is happening in Daejeon might be seen as a model for inter-party cooperation ahead of next spring’s National Assembly races.
The race in South Jeolla province is surprisingly tight (JoongAng again):
The competition was also fierce in Muan-Sinan in South Jeolla as two rivals were fighting within the poll’s margin of error. Kim Hong-up, a Democratic Party candidate and the second son of former President Kim Dae-jung, had 23.3 percent support, while Lee Jae-hyeon, an independent candidate, had 23.1 percent. Grand National candidate Kang Seong-man was backed by 13 percent.
Kim is a crook. His nomination, coming just two years after he got out of jail on a pardon, has clearly generated opposition. I find it interesting that the GNP candidate is generating double didgit support in Jeolla. Perhaps all the work that GNP chairman Kang Jae-sup has put into the southwest is starting to pay off.
If Uri had nominated someone, they might have had a chance to get an unexpected pick-up. Alas, they decided to sit this one out as well in the hope of securing the Democrats’ cooperation in the December presidential race.
Back to the JoongAng piece; this time around there is only one district where the GNP is winning going away:
In Hwaseong, Gyeonggi province, Koh Hee-sun, the Grand National candidate, was leading the poll with 34.6 percent support. His Uri Party competitor, Park Bong-hyeon, was trailing Koh with 11 percent, as was Jang Myeong-gu from the Democratic Labor Party with 8.7 percent.
So Uri is sitting out two of three races in the by-election and is getting spanked in the third. That is quite a fall from the heady days of April 2004, when they dominated the national assembly races.
Does this signal that the Uri party has given up on being a national party? Just a few years ago, they were talking like they were getting rid of regionalism by running strong almost everywhere. Now they seem to be ceding South Jeolla to the Democrats and Daejeon to the PFP.
It is a tactically wise move since a split between the center-left parties means that the GNP can win almost anywhere in a cakewalk. It is something they should have done back in last spring’s local election. But now it might be too-little, too-late since they have no regional base with the possible exception of North Jeolla province.
Finishing behind the DLP in Hwaseong would be a disaster. Not only would it be another blow to their perceive electibility; it would also strengthen the DLP, which is unlikely to join any party coalition.
So let’s make that three races to watch.
