Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo (left) and People’s Power Candidate Se-hoon Oh and People’s Power in the 4/7 Seoul Mayor’s by-election. Hankook Ilbo data photo
Candidate Se-hoon Oh and National Party Candidate Ahn Cheol-soo are about to negotiate full-scale negotiations to unify the opposition candidates for the Seoul Mayor’s by-election. On the 9th, the two repeatedly talked about the need for unification, but negotiating practitioners openly expressed disagreements over the timing of the start of negotiations.
The worst-case scenario is that the disagreement grows and the board breaks, and both of them run for a three-way election. In the June 2018 local election, the negotiations for the unification of the then Barun Future Party candidate Ahn Chul-soo and the Free Korea Party candidate Kim Moon-soo (predecessor of the people’s power) broke down, and the former Mayor Park Won-soon of the Democratic Party laughed. In the conservative camp, ‘2018 and this election are different. It is unlikely that unification will be stranded.’ Why?
① Different electoral structure… The possibility of victory increases when united
In 2018, the discussion of conservative and middle camp candidates for Candidate Chul-soo Ahn and Moon-soo Kim was not very motivated from the beginning. This is because former Mayor Park Won-soon, who challenged the 3rd line, got the victory early. On May 12, a month before the election, the Hankook Ilbo and Korea Research survey found that the combined approval ratings of Candidate Ahn (15.2%) and Candidate Kim (10.5%) were less than that of former Mayor Park (53.0%). Even with the addition of’unification synergy’, it was difficult to expect a turnaround.
At that time, a person who was involved in the unification negotiations at the Ahn election camp said on the 9th that “the two sides were not very willing to make the negotiations come true.”
The mood this year is different. In the JoongAng Ilbo and Ipsos survey on the 7th, the approval ratings of Candidate Se-hoon Oh and Candidate Chul-Soo Ahn were 24.2% and 26.4%, respectively. Assuming that one single candidate absorbs all of the approval ratings, it is calculated that Park Young-sun can outperform the Democratic Party candidate (35.8%). In the virtual bilateral confrontation between the opposition parties in the same investigation, both Oh and Ahn were found to be fighting close to Park candidates within the margin of error. As the’fault’ of unification is largely guaranteed, it is difficult for both Candidate Oh and Candidate A to reject unification.
Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon, the power of the people, visits a mayor in Gangseo-gu, Seoul, and greets merchants on the 9th. yunhap news
② The changed weight of the’regime check theory’
In 2018, the reason for the unification of the candidate was’Moon Jae-in government judgment theory’. However, since the Moon Jae-in administration is in its second year and large events such as the Panmunjom Inter-Korean Summit and the Singapore-North Korea Summit have absorbed public sentiment, the opposition party’s claim to judge the government did not work much.
In three years, public opinion that the government should be checked and judged has grown. This is because penalties such as the government’s practical theory of real estate policy, conflict with the prosecutors’ office, and the damage to people’s livelihoods caused by Corona 19 were piled up. In the JoongAng Ilbo and Ipsos survey on the 7th, 49.9% of claims that’the government should be judged in the by-election’ outperformed the opinion (38.1%) that’state stability is necessary’.
An official from the people’s power said, “It is now public sentiment to check the Moon Jae-in administration. If we fail to unify the candidates in this situation, there will be no hope for the entire opposition, not the power of the people.”
Candidate Ahn Chul-soo, Mayor of the National Assembly Party, is talking with Professor Lee Soo-jeong of the Department of Crime Psychology at Gyeonggi University on the 9th at a cafe in Seodaemun-gu, Seoul about ways to respond to sexual violence in graduate school. Newsis
③ Political life case: Ahn Cheol-soo and Oh Se-hoon… The size of the stake has changed
Candidate Se-Hoon Oh and Chul-Soo Ahn are standing facing each other on a single wooden bridge. Candidate Oh, who was re-elected mayor of Seoul, took the post of free meal referendum in 2011 and wandered for 10 years after resigning, and this election is actually the last chance of a resurgence. Even with the title of the 1st opposition candidate, Ahn won’t be able to pledge the future if he loses the final due to either being pushed down by Ahn or failing to unify.
Candidate Ahn is also desperate. He left politics after losing in the 2018 mayoral election in Seoul and returned to throw the number of winnings, “mayor of Seoul instead of the next presidential election”. This is Ahn’s fourth attempt to unify the candidate by combining the presidential election and the mayor of Seoul. Again,’withdrawal’ from unification negotiations will result in fatal injuries. Losing or yielding to Candidate Oh and pledged for the presidential election may be the next best thing.
An official from Candidate Oh said, “The two candidates sympathized with the rough framework of the rule, and we will not stick to each other’s positions.” An official from Candidate Ahn also said, “I think that negotiations should yield one step at a time even if the interests are different,” and “unification must be done.”
※ For more information, please refer to the website of the Central Election Survey and Deliberation Committee.
Jihyun Kim reporter [email protected]
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