Jeonju-eul’s Re-election Ignites Excitement for Progressive Party Propaganda Without the Democratic Party

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“Don’t you know who hit a rock with an egg? Still, I’m not going to bury an egg on a rock.” On March 28, after passing through Jeonjucheon in full bloom of cherry blossoms and entering Jeonju West Market, Shim Seong-ok (55), the owner of a clothing store, said, pointing to two campaign workers wearing light blue jumpers named ‘Sign No. 4 Kang Seong-hee’. He complained, “I can’t do business,” but praised the ‘light blue jumper election campaigner’, saying, “Whether I’m getting signatures or campaigning, I always carry a garbage bag and clean it up from morning to evening.” “It piles up for a day or two, and after three months, I wonder who the candidate is. Some people call it hitting a rock with an egg, but these days I think it would be nice if people who were sincere like that would come out and fight for a while.”

Jeonju-eul constituency is excited ahead of the 4/5 by-election this year. Contrary to expectations, the candidate of the Progressive Party rose rapidly. In Jeonju-eul, Lee Sang-jik, a former member of the Democratic Party of Korea, was elected again in May of last year when his election was invalidated due to a violation of the Public Official Election Act. When the Democratic Party decided to nominate, former Wanju county governor Lim Jeong-yeop left the Democratic Party and threw a vote as an independent. The Justice Party was unable to nominate a candidate in this election as a leading candidate gave up running for personal reasons. When even Rep. Woon-cheon Jeong (proportional representative), who was elected as the signboard of the Saenuri Party during the 2016 general election, declared not to run, an easy victory for former governor Lim was expected. However, progressive party candidate Kang Sung-hee shook the plate. Candidate Kang is a former labor union executive who created a non-regular union at the Jeonju plant of Hyundai Motor Company in 2003 and led to regularization. In a survey conducted by Realmeter on March 19-21 of 506 voters in Jeonju-eul at the request, Kang scored 25.9% and Lim scored 21.3%. (Confidence level 95%, sampling error ±4.4% points) Request In a survey of 700 voters in Jeonju on March 24-25 by RO STI, Kang received 29.1% and Lim 25.4%. (Confidence level 95%, sampling error ±3.7% points.) Refer to the website of the Investigation Review Committee) It is difficult to predict that a candidate from another party will lead a candidate from the Democratic Party (from) in this region. In the 2016 general election, Saenuri Party candidate Jeong Woon-cheon was able to win (a difference of 111 votes) in a three-way match involving the People’s Party due to fisherman’s geography. “An election campaign? From the end of the early morning bus.” At 7:00 am on March 28, 50 or so campaigners of the Progressive Party gathered at the intersection of Cheonjam-ro, Wansan-gu, Jeonju City, despite the cold weather. Chae Yoo-bin (27), head of the Seoul Youth Progress Party’s university student committee who came down three weeks ago from Seoul, said, “As soon as I got off, I got on the first bus in the morning and said hello on the way to work.” Many of the activists the reporters met that day were supporters from the Central Party like Chae. From March 23, when the election campaign began, former and incumbent leaders, including permanent representative Yoon Hee-sook and former representatives Kim Jae-yeon and Lee Sang-gyu, joined from time to time. The Progressive Party explains that about 300 Progressive Party members are put into election campaigns on weekdays and about 1,500 on weekends. The predecessor of the Progressive Party was the Unified Progressive Party, which was dissolved in 2014 by the Park Geun-hye government. It barely survived as the People’s United Party and the People’s Party, but in the local elections in June of last year, Ulsan Dong-gu Office (Kim Jong-hoon), 3 seats in the metropolitan council, and 17 seats in the local council took the opportunity to turn around. In the process of this election, the Progressive Party did not achieve solidarity with the Justice Party, but it formed a policy alliance with the Green Party and took shape as a single progressive opposition candidate. Jeon Kwon-hee, head of the Jeonbuk Provincial Party Policy Committee of the Progressive Party, said, “Under the keynote that we must fight against the dictatorship of the prosecution by the Yoon Seok-yeol government, next year’s general election should be a venue where the entire opposition can gather strength.” It will be a bridgehead from which we can step out,” he predicted.

Jeonju Eul was not only crowded with people from the Progressive Party, but also spread the curtains everywhere. “Receive the salary of Korea’s No. 1 salesperson in Japan”, “One year of dictatorship by the prosecution is more jingling than 10 years of military dictatorship”. Yoon Seok-yeol’s criticism of the government seemed to be particularly well received. Taxi driver Lee Byeong-yeol (70) said, “Wherever I go around the city, I see cool writings (written by the Progressive Party), so I naturally talk about it.” As the close match continued, candidate Lim Jeong-yeop also launched a full-fledged offensive. Candidate Lim held a press conference at the Jeonbuk Provincial Assembly on the morning of March 28 and raised his voice, saying, “Jeonju cannot be lost to the Progressive Party of the movement.” Two days ago, Park Ji-won, former head of the National Intelligence Service, visited this place and gave support to Lim. Cho Hyeong-cheol, head of the campaign group Lim Jung-yeop, said, “There will definitely be voters who hesitate to vote for the Progressive Party at the polling station after the press conference today.” In the end, the odds are on our side, where the organization has the upper hand.” In the TV debate the next day, Candidate Lim said, “(Candidate Kang in relation to the North Korean missile launch) does not say ‘unjust’, but says ‘unfortunate'” and “claims that the Korea-US alliance is humiliating,” along with People’s Power candidate Kim Gyeong-min. Kang attacked the candidate. It seems that the level of the ‘jongbuk color theory’ is gradually increasing. An official from the Democratic Party of Jeonju said, “It is clear that Candidate Lim is a verified candidate from this region, but he seems to have thought that he could not break through with that. It is difficult to be certain how (such a negative offensive) will affect the voters.” In this election ‘without the Democratic Party’, it seems that the direction of public sentiment that has broken away from the Democratic Party will decide the outcome. A woman in her 30s who works at a real estate agency in Hyoja-dong, a new town, said, “There are probably quite a few people like me who are not interested in politics here, saying, ‘The power of the people is better’.” “The Democratic Party is not doing its job properly. ” he said. Cho Kyu-sik (47), who runs a distribution agency, said, “I only took pictures of people (Democratic Party candidates) for a while. Then I became a supporter of Ahn Cheol-soo, and after pushing the Justice Party, I recently became a member of the Progressive Party,” he said. Reporter Jeonju/Ha Eo-young [email protected]