South Korea presidential election: Early count shows no clear winner in tightly-fought race between Yoon Suk-yeol and Lee Jae-myung
- With 37 per cent of ballots counted, analysts say it’s tough to predict the outcome until early Thursday
- The eventual victor will have to tackle deepening inequality and navigate ties with Washington and Beijing, amid growing anti-Chinese sentiment in South Korea
An exit poll jointly conducted by South Korea’s three largest terrestrial television broadcasting companies gave Yoon a razor-thin 0.6 percentage point lead over Lee, with 48.4 per cent of the vote. Lee had 47.8 per cent. However, another poll by broadcaster JTBC showed Lee leading with 48.4 per cent of the vote and Yoon with 47.7 per cent.
“The margin is too narrow to call,” said TV commentator Chun Won-chaek. Echoing him, TV commentator Yoo Si-min said: “I never expected to see such a tight race in the election”.
Despite a surge in Omicron cases among the country’s 52 million population, voter turnout hit 77.1 per cent, with more than 34 million people casting their ballots at 14,464 polling stations as of 7.30pm when polls were closed. This included those who took part in early voting last Friday and Saturday and was slightly down from the 77.2 percent recorded during the previous presidential election in 2017.
Some 1 million voters among the 44 million eligible voters have tested positive for the virus and many showed up at voting stations during the specially designated time slot of 6pm to 7.30pm local time, after the exit polls were done.