This Weekend, Lee Jae-myung Heads to Chungcheong, Yoon Seok-yeol to Honam... Strategic and Vulnerable Areas Court Voter Support

Finding Relatively Weak Regions Before Approval Ratings Stagnate to Gather Votes

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy reporters Ki-min Lee and Jun-yi Park] Presidential candidates Lee Jae-myung and Yoon Seok-youl will each visit the vulnerable and strategically important regions of Chungcheong and Honam this weekend. Their strategy is to actively court votes by visiting these vulnerable areas just before candidate registration and the official start of the election campaign.

According to political circles on the 11th, candidate Lee will visit the Chungcheong area and Jeju on the 12th and 13th. On the 12th alone, Lee plans to travel extensively across Chungcheong, starting in Daejeon and moving through Sejong, Cheonan, and Chungju, announcing various Chungcheong pledges and communicating with citizens. He will also meet with local media to discuss regional issues and visions. In Jeju, he plans to pay respects at the April 3rd Peace Park, announce Jeju-related pledges, and continue his public engagement at Seogwipo City Hall.

Candidate Yoon will board the regional tour train called the 'Passion Train' starting on the 12th, touring the Jeolla region. The train will stop at various historical sites where he will meet local residents. On the first day, he will visit Jeonju, Namwon, Suncheon, and Yeosu; on the following day, the 13th, he will pass through Boseong, Gwangju, Muan, and Mokpo. Lee Jun-seok, leader of the People Power Party, will board the train a day earlier on the 11th in Cheonan, Chungnam.

The reason both candidates are visiting these regions just before candidate registration and the start of campaigning appears to be an effort to maximize voter support in relatively weaker areas before their approval ratings solidify, through active communication.

In the case of candidate Lee, his support in Chungcheong?a region considered a presidential election barometer?is somewhat lower than that of candidate Yoon. Furthermore, Lee’s recent regional activities have been concentrated in the Seoul metropolitan area and the Yeongnam and Honam regions, and his remarks about relocating the Korea Military Academy to Andong have drawn criticism from Democratic Party lawmakers and local government heads in Chungcheong, causing public sentiment to become agitated.

Therefore, Lee plans to announce various development pledges for the Chungcheong region, including relocating the administrative capital, and engage in direct communication during his visit. "The second destination of the weekly 'Maetabus' (a bus for public livelihood) was supposed to be Chungcheong, but we couldn’t visit due to the spread of COVID-19," he said. "This time, we plan to visit Chungcheong to listen to public sentiment."

The People Power Party is also pursuing a strategy to make a breakthrough in Honam, a historically weak area for conservative parties in presidential elections. This is why candidate Yoon is visiting Honam to court votes following his visit to Gwangju last weekend.

Yoon’s visit to Honam will be his fourth since his nomination, and ahead of the train tour, the People Power Party invested in sending all preliminary candidate promotional materials to Honam as 'handwritten letters.'

A senior official from the People Power Party’s campaign headquarters explained, "This is to actively embrace the Honam region, which conservative governments have paid little attention to in the past, and to demonstrate our commitment to 'unified politics' regardless of region or faction."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.