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South Koreans headed to the polls on Wednesday to elect a brand new president after one of the vital bitter political campaigns in current reminiscence.
The winner will face mounting challenges within the type of an omicron-driven surge in COVID-19 infections and an more and more belligerent North Korea.
Presidents serve a single time period of 5 years.
Polls opened at 6 a.m. native time (2100 UTC) and can shut at 6 p.m. After polling stations shut, COVID-positive voters will probably be allowed to forged their ballots for 90 minutes.
Election authorities stated 61% of South Korea’s 44 million eligible voters had forged their vote by 1 p.m.on Wednesday. This contains file turnout in early voting that started Friday.
Who’re the principle contenders?
The election has turn into a decent race between the 2 main candidates — liberal Lee Jae-Myung and conservative Yoon Suk-yeol.
Each candidates are so unpopular that native media have dubbed the competition the “election of the unfavorables.”
Yoon of the principle opposition Individuals Energy Celebration has vowed to root out corruption and take a hawkish line towards North Korea. He has threatened a preemptive strike if obligatory.
Lee of the ruling Democratic Celebration was governor of essentially the most populous province of Gyeonggi.
He shot to fame along with his aggressive coronavirus responses and a slew of recent insurance policies, together with a common fundamental earnings and free college uniforms.
A victory for Yoon would symbolize a outstanding turnaround for the conservatives which were in disarray for the reason that impeachment and dismissal of President Park Geun-Hye.
What are the important thing points?
High considerations amongst younger voters, who’re prone to show decisive, are the skyrocketing housing costs within the capital, Seoul, home inequality, and cussed youth unemployment.
Each candidates have vowed to construct new properties however supplied starkly completely different options to the disaster. Lee depends on left-leaning public housing and Yoon on market-led options.
North Korea additionally stays of the key points within the election.
Pyongyang has carried out a record-breaking blitz of weapons assessments this 12 months, together with a launch simply days earlier than the election.
The brand new president will face the duty of initiating negotiations to curb the North’s nuclear ambitions.
adi/ (AFP, Reuters)
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