장미대선 D-30, 한달이면 승부 결승난다
The date is set, the clock is ticking,... and the presidential hopefuls are busy trying to raise support from Korean voters who'll head to the polls in just a month.
The early election comes as the country needs to elect a new president within 60 days after the former President Park was expelled from office, making May 9th the big day.
And in that one-month period, there's a lot to be done procedurally by both the candidates and the authorities.
The National Election Commission will open a two-day candidate registration period from the 15th, followed by an official 22-day campaign period that begins on the 17th.
Some 297-thousand overseas Koreans that had registered to vote in 116 countries worldwide will be able to cast their ballots during a six-day period starting the 25th.
And for those in Korea, early voting will begin on the fourth and fifth of May.
With the primaries over, the race is only tightening.
The first polls after the five major parties locked in their candidates show Ahn Cheol-soo of the centrist People's Party quickly catching up with front-runner Moon Jae-in of the Democratic Party of Korea,... now behind only 3 percentage points.
Ratings for Moon are up 7 percentage points from a week earlier at 38-percent, while Ahn gained a whopping 16-percentage points, putting him at 35 percent.
Conservative candidates Hong Joon-pyo from the Liberty Korea Party and Yoo Seong-min from the break-away Bareun Party pulled 7 and 4 percent support, respectively.
The left-wing Justice Party candidate Shim Sang-jung, in the mean time, pulled her support ratings up from the one-percent range
Shin Se-min, Arirang News.
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