With less than three weeks to go to the presidential election, voters in South Korea are being bombarded with public opinion polls providing updates on the state of the race.

From the way things look now, the contest is a duel between liberal standard-bearer Moon Jae-in and centrist Ahn Cheol-soo, with the former leading by a 4-14 percent margin. (Moon garners 40-44 percent of support while Ahn posts 36-37 percent.)

The Korea Herald has taken a look at the latest poll results to identify the core supporter bases of Moon, Ahn and other mainstream party-backed candidates in terms of political inclination, gender, age and occupation.




Moon Jae-in: Under-50s, women and office workers

The frontrunner status of Moon, the Democratic Party of Korea candidate, appears to be fueled in large part by younger voters. A recent poll by Gallup Korea showed that 48 percent of those aged between 19 and 29 support Moon, while the figures for voters in their 30s and 40s were 65 percent and 56 percent, respectively.

Realmeter’s survey also showed similar results, with figures for the three age groups ranging from 53 percent to 63 percent.


By occupation, Moon is the favorite of office workers. Surveys show more than half of them prefer Moon. The figure for Moon’s closest rival Ahn Cheol-soo of the People’s Party falls short of 30 percent.

The lawyer-turned-politician also stands out from his peers in his apparent appeal to female voters. Moon is reputed to be popular among younger female voters, and some poll results back up the hearsay. In the most recent Realmeter survey, 47 percent and 42 percent of female and male respondents, respectively, chose Moon.

About two-thirds of voters with progressive political views support Moon, while about 40 percent of centrist voters say that they will vote for the Democratic Party candidate.


Ahn Cheol-soo: Over 50s, conservatives

Ahn’s main supporter base has changed drastically since 2012, going from young liberals and centrists to older conservatives.

Recent polls show that Ahn has the most support from those over the age of 50. In 2012, those aged between 19 and 39 were his main supporters.

Recent Gallup polls showed that over 50 percent of those older than 50 support Ahn. Similar results were shown in a poll conducted by Realmeter, in which 44.5 percent of those in their 50s picked Ahn, while 58 percent of voters over the age of 60 preferred him over other candidates.

In a race lacking a strong conservative contender, nearly half of conservative voters responding to polls picked Ahn. In comparison, only about a quarter of those who identify themselves as conservative say that they will vote for Hong Joon-pyo of the Liberty Korea Party or the Bareun Party’s Yoo Seong-min.


The conservatives and the leftwing crusader

Perhaps predictably, Hong’s largest support come from those older than 60. In the recent Gallup poll, 20 percent of those aged 60 or more said that they would vote for the former South Gyeongsang Province governor, while the Realmeter figure came to 15.1 percent. Figures for other age groups fell below 10 percent.

As for Yoo, his ratings remain at one of the lowest seen for a party-backed conservative at under 5 percent, and polls show no clear support group for the Bareun Party candidate.

The situation for former labor activist Sim Sang-jeung of the Justice Party is similar to that of Yoo. Her supporters are few in number, and her track record puts them on the fence about whether they would maintain their support on the voting day.

In her third presidential bid, Sim has declared that she will see her campaign to the end but her ratings hover around 3 percent. In addition, a large chunk of her small number of supporters say that they could vote for another candidate depending on the situation. In her previous attempts, her campaign was merged with those of other progressive candidates.

By Choi He-suk (cheesuk@heraldcorp.com)