Park hangs on to lead over Moon

By Lee Joo-heePresidential candidate Park Geun-hye of the Saenuri Party held on to her narrow lead against Moon Jae-in of the Democratic United Party despite a closing gap following the endorsement of former independent runner Ahn Cheol-soo, polls over the weekend showed.The close race between the conservative and liberal flag-bearers is getting down to the wire as both camps have finalized their manifestos books and are now canvassing for votes in key battleground areas including the Seoul metropolitan region, Busan and South Gyeongsang Province.Both camps ratcheted up attacks against each other while portraying the still changeable poll numbers in their favor.“(We) don’t pay attention to the survey’s indexes. The fact that we have maintained consistency ever since the official campaign began by looking only at the people’s livelihood is a great comfort to us at this moment of highest tension,” said Lee Jung-hyun, Park’s chief communications man.Moon’s side, in the meantime, tried to highlight the tapering gap.“The support for Moon has returned to an upward trend. Although the upturn is not too rapid, it is still incredibly encouraging that Moon’s support ratings that had remained stagnant or declined have turned upward, considering how a candidate that showed rising support toward the end of the race always won in past elections,” said Rep. Woo Sang-ho, Moon’s communications chief. The candidates will have three more days of surveys, after which any releases will be banned by the election law.The polls conducted by various media from the day Ahn joined Moon’s campaign on Dec. 6 to the latest over the weekend showed that Moon inched closer to the frontrunner.The gap ranged from between 4.0 and 6.8 percentage points, according to the surveys conducted by Chosun Ilbo, Hankyoreh, Kookmin Ilbo, SBS and JTBC.The survey by SBS on Saturday showed Park held 47.6 percent of support, compared to Moon’s 43.6 percent. This gap of 4 percentage points had narrowed from a week earlier when Park had 46 percent, beating Moon’s 37.8 percent by 8.2 percentage points.The polls by Hankyoreh and Korea Society Research Institute, on the other hand, showed the gap slightly widened to 4.3 percentage points from 4 percentage points a week earlier.A survey by Research and Research on 1,060 respondents on Dec. 6-8 showed that Moon’s ratings surged by 0.6 percentage points to 43 percent, while Park saw a drop by 0.6 percentage points to 43.6 percent.It further showed that Park lost her votes from respondents in Seoul and those in their 40s. Of the Seoul residents, 40.3 percent picked Park while 43.1 percent chose Moon. Among the 40-somethings, 42.1 percent supported Park, while 46.5 percent preferred Moon.As the poll numbers cast an unpredictable future, the rivaling campaign teams further intensified their offensives.The Saenuri Party continued to criticize the alliance between Moon and Ahn by calling it a superficial union.“It seems that Moon having declared his vision for a joint government without consulting with Ahn was because he was pressing for the votes of Ahn’s supporters. If the joint government of Moon-Ahn-Sim (Moon Jae-in, Ahn Cheol-soo and Sim Sang-jeong) is to be formed, it will lead to conflict of values, struggle of ideologies and battle for power,” said Saenuri Party spokesman Rep. Lee Sang-il. Moon had said on Sunday that he will build a people’s party to create a new political order, apparently eyeing voters apathetic to established politics. Sim, a former presidential candidate on the ticket of the pro-labor Progressive Justice Party, withdrew from the race on Nov. 26 in support of Moon.Lee argued that the differing stance held by Ahn and Sim on key foreign affairs and security issues such as the Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement and the withdrawal of the U.S. Forces Korea will end up creating confusion.The DUP, on their part, honed in on Park’s communication style, branding it as anti-democracy and oppressive.“We cannot but question whether the Saenuri Party’s uncommunicative politics ― which restrict the public’s right-to-know by selectively attending TV debates after measuring their pros and cons ― should be considered an appropriate attitude for the ruling party preparing to win the next administration,” Rep. Woo said.“We would like to raise a question whether (the Saenuri Party candidate and the entire campaign team) are trying to use the means of control and selection (by discrimination) as the method to operate the Republic of Korea.”Park, in the meantime, finalized her pledge book on Monday aimed at underscoring her policies designed for each generation, women, irregular workers, the disabled, small and medium-sized businesses and the farming and fishing sector. She also included development pledges for 15 regions excluding Seoul in an attempt to reach out to the nook-and-cranny electorate.Moon, on his part, released his human rights pledges at a press conference the same day, promising to expand the freedom of expression and political suffrage and to introduce alternative military service system. While not included in the 10-point policies, Moon also urged for the improvement of human rights situation in North Korea when asked about his views during the question and answer session.Offering credence to the DUP candidate’s expansion of power base, Kim Deog-ryong, former special adviser to the president for integration of the Korean people and former Grand National Party floor leader, declared his support for Moon.In their last leg of the campaign, Park is to make her last round of nationwide tour starting with Jeju on Tuesday. Moon is to visit Chuncheong Province on Wednesday, to be followed by trips to Jeolla province, Busan and South Gyeongsnag Province.()