스튜디오 대담
Korean presidential election 2022: What to watch out for tonight election night.
Let's start with:
-young voters
-record-high early voter turnout
-election amid covid
Impressive moments during the campaign race
-active digital campaigning
-PPP and People's Party coalition
-family trouble
Is there a special region that you're eyeing out for?
-Cheongju
-Seoul metropolitan region
Let's compare the two main contenders' diplomatic, security policies
-economic policies
[Importance of this year's election] moving forward
[Young voters]
It's a tightly contested race between Lee Jae-myung and Yoon Suk-yeol.
A staggering 20-percent of eligible voters are categorized as swing voters.
Bloomberg reported today that the country's next five years are going to be determined by voters that are in their 20s and 30s... which together account for more than 14-point-2-million voters.
That's slightly lower than that of five years ago... which stood at 14-point-9 million voters.
These young voters feel left behind by rising home prices and anemic wage growth... they're expected to become the decisive force in this election... not having to be able to have a house in the Seoul Metropolitan Area even after marriage.
This kind of frustration suggests the risk of losing the younger vote is larger for Lee than Yoon as the representative of the ruling party and the status quo... but we can't be certain at this hour.
An average apartment in Seoul now costs more than one-million U.S. dollars... which have doubled over the past five years.
Also monthly wages among these young voters have stalled after the pandemic... they may disagree with the idea of blanket income support.
Slow wage growth is also adding to the reasons why more people are putting off, or giving up on marriage. That is pushing the world’s lowest fertility rate down each year.
In contrast, middle-aged and older citizens are snapping up more homes each year, with many relying on credit that is driving up household debt to record levels -- and apartment prices along with it.
Voters in their 60s or older account for the highest portion... at over 13-million this year.
They're followed by those in their 50s... and then those in their 40-somethings... according to the National Election Commission.
〈Early voting〉
Voter interest is unprecedentedly keen in this year's election as seen in the record turnout in last week's early voting.
More than 16 million, or nearly 37-percent of total of registered voters had already cast their ballots in the early voting last Friday and Saturday... the highest level since the early voting system was introduced in 2014.
It recorded around 12-percent in 2014 and 2016 general election.
26-percent in the 2017 presidential election.... and 27-percent in the 2020 general election.
This high early voter turnout... is it beneficial to one side? That's up for debate.
One side says it's a result of people wanting for a change in government from the ruling Democratic Party of Korea and its candidate Lee... while other says it indicates it's a backfire from the coalition of Yoon and Ahn... with voters saying they can't really rely on politicans and their words... Ahn had told eligible voters that he will prevail until the finish line which is the presidential race.
〈COVID-19〉
The election also takes place at a time when South Korea has seen COVID-19 cases exploding in recent weeks... due to the highly transmissible Omicron variant... 342-thousand daily new cases just recorded earlier today.
A lack of preparations led to blunders during early voting.
There were reports that some were not able to vote in the end because they were not able to wait in line for a long time due to the sickness.
And some votes could not be collected and instead were collected in plastic bags and other containers, rather than ballot boxes... which is against election laws... because that could be problematic for many reasons including room for fraudulent voting.
We've have to see if this plays a significant role to push voters to actually show up to vote.
Despite this, today... that's not going to happen since voting hours for COVID-19 patients and those in quarantine would be able to have a separate hour and a half to cast their ballets in the ballot boxes themselves... after six PM.
Impressive moments during the campaign race
[digital campaigning]
It was interesting to see that the presidential candidates were very active in their online platforms.
The ruling Democratic Party of Korea's website "Jaeming" which means fun in Korean... offered a lot of digital content related to Lee Jae-myung and his campaign pledges...
#SouthKorea #presidential_election #candidate
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2022-03-09, 19:00 (KST)
