Lee 32%, Chong 29%, Roh 14%

The Dong A Daily and Korea Research Center (KRC) conducted a nationwide phone survey on 1,572 adults on September 25, 2002, which was just after Thanksgiving Holiday. According to the poll, in a presidential race where many candidates participate, Grand National Party’s Presidential Candidate Lee Hui-chang is advantageous over the others. But, in a two-man race, independent Congressman Chong Mong-jun has more chances. The majority of the respondents predict that the coalition of Rep. Chong and Millennium Democratic Party’s Candidate Roh Moo-hyun would probably not be realized.

In a five-men race where Lee Hui-chang, Roh Moo-hyun, Chong Mong-jun, former Premier Lee Han-dong, and Kwon Young-gil of Democratic Labor Party (DLP) join, 32.0% of respondents supported Lee Hui-chang, 28.5% Chong, 14.4% Roh, 0.9% Kwon, and 0.5% Lee Han-dong. But Lee Hui-chang’s lead over Chong is within the sampling error. Comparing this result with that of our paper’s Sep. 7th poll, the gap between Lee Hui-chang and Chong has been widened a little from 0.7% to 3.5%. For Roh, his supporting rates have been down by 3.2%.

In addition, in the Sep. 7th poll, Roh exceeded all the other candidates in Honam Area. In that poll, 48.2% of respondents in that region supported Roh Moo-hyun, and 25.3% Chong. But in the survey conducted this time, Chong exceeds Roh. 36.1% of the people who participated in the survey answered they support Chong Mong-jun, while 30.6% support Roh.

If Rep. Chong should succeed in unifying with Millennium Democratic Party (MDP) and participate in the presidential race as the sole candidate of the unified party, he would beat Lee Hui-chang. Under this scenario, Chong receives 41.7% support and Lee 34.7%. If Roh should take Chong’s place under the same circumstances, Lee would lead the race with 41.2% supporters, while 31.9% support Roh, 10.2% behind his opponent Lee.

To a question “What do you think of the possibility that Roh and Chong succeed in unification?” 56.5% of respondents answered, “That’s impossible,” while only 18.8% said, “That’s possible.” If the two agreed to make a coalition, 44.8% of respondents said they support Chong as the presidential candidate of the unified party. On the other hand, 29.1% supported Roh.

In terms of supporting rates for political parties, Grand National Party takes the first place with 31.5%, followed by the MDP (14.8%), the DLP (3.1%) and United Democratic Liberal (0.7%).

The sampling error of this poll is ±2.5% within 95% reliability. For more details, please visit our web site at www.donga.com.

sunny60@donga.com