2012 South Korean presidential election

2012 South Korean presidential election

← 2007 19 December 2012 2017 →
Turnout75.84% (Increase12.81pp)
 
경희대 문재인.jpg
Nominee Park Geun-hye Moon Jae-in
Party Saenuri Democratic United
Popular vote 15,773,128 14,692,632
Percentage 51.56% 48.02%


President before election

Lee Myung-bak
Saenuri

Elected President

Park Geun-hye
Saenuri

Presidential elections were held in South Korea on 19 December 2012. They were the sixth presidential elections since democratization and the establishment of the Sixth Republic, and were held under a first-past-the-post system, in which there was a single round of voting and the candidate receiving the highest number of votes was elected. Under the South Korean constitution, a president is restricted to a single five-year term in office. The term of the then incumbent president Lee Myung-bak ended on 24 February 2013. According to the Korea Times, 30.7 million people voted with turnout at 75.8%. Park Geun-hye of the Saenuri party was elected the first female South Korean president with 51.6% of the vote opposed to 48.0% for her opponent Moon Jae-in. Park's share of the vote was the highest won by any candidate since the beginning of free and fair direct elections in 1987 and the first such election in which any candidate won a majority. Moreover, as of the 2022 election, this is the latest South Korean presidential election in which the winning candidate won an absolute majority of the vote.

In 2017, following Park's impeachment and removal from office, Moon would go on to succeed her as the 12th president of South Korea following a second, successful bid for the presidency in the 2017 presidential election.

Background

Lee Myung-bak was elected President of South Korea in 2007 as the nominee of the conservative Grand National Party after a closely contested primary in which he narrowly defeated Park Geun-hye, and assumed office in February 2008. His victory brought to a close ten years of liberal administration under Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun. The Lee Myung-bak government pursued the reduction of government bureaucracy and a laissez-faire economic policy, and came under criticism from the left for political scandals and controversial policies such as the Jeju-do Naval Base and its support of the South Korea-United States Free Trade Agreement, although both were initiated under the previous administration. Despite the fact that he was elected in a landslide victory and received initial approval ratings of 70%, Lee's ratings had declined to below 30% by 2012.

At the end of 2011, Park Geun-hye assumed control of the Grand National Party, which was subsequently renamed the Saenuri or New Frontier Party in February 2012. She distanced herself from Lee and led the party towards the center. In legislative elections in April 2012, Park guided the party to an upset victory, returning its majority in the National Assembly. This contributed to an increase in her poll ratings and consolidated her position as frontrunner for the Saenuri nomination.

Opposition to Saenuri was divided primarily between the Democratic United Party and independent supporters of Ahn Cheol-soo, who emerged as a leading potential candidate despite his ostensible silence on the race. In the DUP, focus initially lay on Sohn Hak-kyu as a potential nominee, but by late 2011 Moon Jae-in, a confidant of former president Roh, had overtaken Sohn in polls. Although the DUP invited Ahn to join the party, only 2.3% of respondents to a poll on 21 April thought that Ahn was best suited to be DUP nominee. The DUP itself has been troubled by the split between pro-Roh members such as Moon Jae-in and the "Honam wing" of former president Kim Dae-jung, represented by Chung Dong-young.

Registered candidates

Ballot numbers for party candidates were given according to the candidate's party seat distribution in the National Assembly. Ballot numbers for independent candidates were determined through a random lottery by the National Election Commission.

1 2 3 (Resigned) 4 5 6 7
Park Geun-hye Moon Jae-in Lee Jung-hee Park Jong-sun Kim So-yeon Kang Ji-won Kim Soon-ja
Saenuri Democratic United Unified Progressive Independent Independent Independent Independent

Nominations

Democratic United Party

Nominee

Democratic Party (South Korea, 2011)
Democratic Party (South Korea, 2011)
Democratic Party candidate
Moon Jae-in
Member of the

National Assembly
(2012– )

Campaign

The 2012 Democratic United Party presidential primary saw an open primary system implemented for the first time. This new open primary introduced "mobile voting"; it was hailed as a "revolution in voting" because people could participate in voting more conveniently. However, controversies persisted during the primary elections, as questions of the legitimacy and trustworthiness of the voting results were raised. The official result was announced on 16 September 2012, at 15:32 KST, naming Moon Jae-in the presidential candidate from the Democratic United Party. After winning the nomination, Moon stated that he would like to join forces with Ahn Cheol-soo.

Candidates

Jo, Kim J and Kim Y were disqualified by the party through a cutoff poll, where only top five candidates were allowed to pass to primaries. Park withdrew before the primaries began.

Results

P= Pre-registered electors who voted at Polling booths; M: Pre-registered electors who voted through Mobile devices; D= Party Delegates who voted at the polling booths

Moon Jae-in won the nomination on the first ballot, so no run-off contest was needed.

Absolute majority needed to win
Dates Races Moon Sohn Kim Chung Total
Votes % Votes % Votes % Votes % Votes %
25 Aug. Jeju P 301 49.5 155 25.5 134 22.0 18 3.0 608 100
M 11,701 60.5 3,693 20.5 2,739 14.2 942 4.9 19,35 100
D 21 14.1 52 34.9 71 47.7 5 3.4 149 100
26 Aug. Ulsan P 176 58.5 42 14.0 50 16.6 33 11.0 301 100
M 4,719 51.9 1,058 11.6 2,974 32.7 347 3.8 9,098 100
D 56 51.4 17 15.6 29 26.6 7 6.4 109 100
28 Aug. Gangwon P 192 50.0 121 31.5 52 13.5 19 4.9 384 100
M 2,598 46.9 2,075 37.4 574 10.4 298 5.4 5,545 100
D 47 18.2 132 51.2 52 20.2 27 10.5 258 100
30 Aug. N. Chungcheong P 209 39.5 232 43.9 80 15.1 8 1.5 529 100
M 7,796 46.4 6,755 40.2 1,780 10.6 455 2.7 16,786 100
D 127 39.4 121 37.6 71 22.0 3 0.9 322 100
1 Sep. N. Jeolla P 782 17.1 1,259 27.5 684 14.9 1,855 40.5 4,580 100
M 15,489 40.3 8,757 22.8 4,707 12.3 9,443 24.6 38,396 100
D 79 13.7 177 30.7 63 10.9 258 44.7 577 100
2 Sep. Incheon P 191 42.9 153 34.4 73 16.4 28 6.3 445 100
M 5,607 51.2 2,841 25.9 1,823 16.6 687 6.3 10,958 100
D 130 30.2 149 34.6 80 18.6 72 16.7 431 100
4 Sep. S. Gyeongsang P 354 25.1 136 9.6 908 64.3 14 1.0 1,412 100
M 11,216 46.5 2,256 9.4 10,265 42.6 374 1.6 24,111 100
D 113 29.4 52 13.5 208 54.0 12 3.1 385 100
6 Sep. Gwangju

S. Jeolla

P 1,385 27.6 2,182 43.4 1,257 25.0 200 4.0 5,024 100
M 32,345 50.5 20,053 31.3 9,546 14.9 2,105 3.3 64,049 100
D 179 19.9 375 41.7 215 23.9 130 14.5 899 100
8 Sep. Busan P 714 64.1 90 8.1 290 26.0 20 1.8 1,114 100
M 17,162 66.4 2,577 10.0 5,542 21.4 562 2.2 25,843 100
D 259 62.6 59 14.3 75 18.1 21 5.1 414 100
9 Sep. Daejeon

Sejong

S. Chungcheong

P 468 57.1 215 26.3 95 11.6 41 5.0 819 100
M 14,373 63.3 4,026 17.7 2,481 10.9 1,838 8.1 22,718 100
D 263 48.1 139 25.4 64 11.7 81 14.8 547 100
12 Sep. Daegu

N. Gyeongsang

P 365 57.4 90 14.2 169 26.6 12 1.9 636 100
M 9,745 57.5 3,028 17.9 3,318 19.6 846 5.0 16,937 100
D 165 34.7 96 20.2 134 28.2 80 16.8 475 100
15 Sep. Gyeonggi P 1,219 55.7 677 30.9 187 8.5 107 4.9 2,190 100
M 47,844 63.5 17,270 22.9 6,661 8.8 3,527 4.7 75,302 100
D 522 37.0 530 37.5 130 9.2 230 16.3 1,412 100
16 Sep. Seoul P 1,434 56.3 688 27.0 229 9.0 195 7.7 2,546 100
M 156,122 60.8 53,197 20.7 29,845 11.6 17,756 6.9 256,920 100
D 715 42.5 41 24.4 187 11.1 371 22.0 1,683 100
Total 347,183 56.5 136,205 22.2 87,842 14.3 43027 7.0 614,257 100

Saenuri Party

Nominee

Saenuri Party
Saenuri Party
Saenuri Party candidate
Park Geun-hye
Leader of the
Saenuri Party
(2011–2012)

Campaign

The first member of the Saenuri Party to officially announce their candidacy was Kim Moon-soo on 22 April. Kim, a former labor activist, stated in his announcement that he would focus on combating regional and socioeconomic divides, emphasized his commitment to a policy of multiculturalism, and argued for a revision in Saenuri's primary system. He stated further that Park Geun-hye's leadership of the party represented only an "ambiguously prevailing trend", and could not be relied upon to reach victory in the elections. Although Kim said that he was "convinced" he could "attract more support than [Park]", he was not widely expected to garner a high level of support. His early announcement was regarded as an attempt to preemptively form an anti-Park faction in the party.

Chung Mong-joon, a billionaire and longstanding member of the National Assembly, followed on 29 April. In his announcement, Chung emphasized the need to confront regionalism and factional politics, and stated that he would "write a new history of the Republic of Korea by facilitating [his] experience of managing a business, engaging in diplomacy and creating unity in the nation". He stressed that his task was to "bring together the divided hearts of the people" and that he was concerned that the "country could collapse in its current situation". Like Kim Moon-soo, Chung is expected to be at a disadvantage to Park. Chung previously declared his candidacy in the 2002 presidential elections but later dropped out to endorse Roh Moo-hyun.

The former Mayor of Incheon, Ahn Sang-soo, declared his candidacy on 6 May, emphasizing his economic credentials and stating that he would relieve the burden of debt. Former presidential Chief of Staff Yim Tae-hee followed on 8 May, issuing a call for Park Geun-hye to act as a "kingmaker" that was interpreted as a request for her to step aside. Yim, a moderate, proposed to join hands with independent Ahn Cheol-soo and DUP frontrunner Moon Jae-in in a bid to "demolish outdated politics". On 10 May, five-term lawmaker and former Minister for Government Legislation and Special Affairs Lee Jae-oh announced his bid, promising to reform the constitution and cut his term as president to three years.

The campaign for the Saenuri primaries has been characterized by a dispute between Park Geun-hye, as frontrunner and party leader, and her opponents in the party. She was cited in 2009 as the most influential politician in South Korea, and has outranked other candidates in many polls throughout 2012, though as of early May 2012 she is yet to officially declare her candidacy. Park's opponents have called for Saenuri to adopt an open primary system rather than the present system based on an electoral college and opinion poll results. At the end of April the Democratic United Party suggested a joint discussion on the issue of fully open primaries. Park has been criticized for her taciturn and authoritarian style in leading the party, and Kim Moon-soo described her as overly "secretive". Chung Mong-joon stated that under Park's leadership, "democracy in the party [had] gone missing". Park strengthened her position when her ally Lee Hahn-koo was elected Saenuri's floor leader on 9 May.

During a primary debate on 7 August 2012, primary candidate Kim Tae-ho asked if Park Geun-hye would agree that the May 16 coup by her father (Park Chung Hee) was both a coup and a "necessary decision", regarding Park's previous stance that the overthrow was a "revolution to save the country". Park confirmed her stance by answering, "I don’t think it’s the place of politicians to be fighting over whether [the 16 May incident] were a 'coup d’etat' or a 'revolution'”. She furthermore commented that "no one can refute that the events themselves did happen, whether you call them a 'coup' or a 'revolution.'” and that "we need to leave that issue" for history to decide. In addition, during another debate on 8 August 2012, the moderator asked Park the minimum hourly rate for a part-time worker as of 2012. Park replied "I think it’s over 5,000 won, isn’t it?,” when the legal minimum wage was 4,580 won. In response, The South Korean Confederation of Trade Unions responded with a statement in which it said, "It is terribly discouraging when a person who wants to become president does not even know the country’s minimum wage, which is a minimal right for survival and the first step toward a welfare state".

Candidates

Chung and Lee, in protest of the controversial primary rule negotiations, withdrew their bids for nomination before the convention.

Results

The official result was announced at Saenuri National Convention, which took place on 20 August 2012 at 05:40 KST, nominating Park Geun-hye as the presidential candidate for the Saenuri Party.

Candidate Place Votes Percentage
Park Geun-hye Nominated 86,589 83.97%
Kim Moon-soo 2nd 8,955 8.68%
Kim Tae-ho 3rd 3,298 3.20%
Yim Tae-hee 4th 2,676 2.69%
Ahn Sang-soo 5th 1,600 1.55%
103,118 100.0%

Third parties and independent candidates

Registered

Lee Jung-hee (Unified Progressive Party)
Former leader of UPP and former Member of National Assembly

Kim So-yeon (Independent)
Elected to the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions

Kim Soon-ja (Independent)
A Cleaning worker, and New Progressive Party candidate in 2012 South Korean legislative election

Kang Ji-won (Independent)
Chairman of Korea Manifesto Center

Park Jong-sun (Independent)
A former entrepreneur

Withdrawn

Lee Gun-gae
A former National Assembly Member

Opinion polling

Poll source Date Sample size Margin
Park (%)
Saenuri
Moon (%)
DUP
JoongAng Ilbo 19–21 July 2012 2,000 56.6 35.0 21.6
OhMyNews/Research View 16–17 July 2012 1,000 50.8 41.0 9.8
Realmeter 29 May – 1 June 2012 3,000 52.5 38.6 13.9
Hankyoreh /Korea Society Opinion Institute 26–27 May 2012 61.0 33.5 27.5
Realmeter 21–25 May 2012 3,750 52.6 37.9 14.7
JoongAng Ilbo 15 May 2012 910 57.6 33.3 24.3
Realmeter 14–18 May 2012 3,750 52.0 37.5 14.5
Realmeter 7–11 May 2012 3,750 51.9 38.2 13.7
Realmeter 7–8 May 2012 1,500 55.7 36.3 19.4
Realmeter 30 April – 4 May 2012 3,000 52.4 38.0 14.4
Realmeter 23–27 April 2012 3,750 50.9 40.3 10.6
Realmeter 6–10 February 2012 3,750 44.3 43.0 1.3
Realmeter 30 January – 3 February 2012 3,750 44.4 44.9 0.5
Donga Ilbo 24 January 2012 46.7 38.4 8.3

Exit poll

KBS, MBC, and SBS Terrestrial Broadcasting Exit Survey

Candidate Estimated percentage
Park Geun-hye 50.1%
Moon Jae-in 48.9%

Results

Provinces and cities won by
– Park Geun-hye
– Moon Jae-in
Districts won by
– Park Geun-hye
– Moon Jae-in
Districts won by
– Park Geun-hye
– Moon Jae-in
Districts won by
– Park Geun-hye
– Moon Jae-in
CandidatePartyVotes%
Park Geun-hyeSaenuri Party15,773,12851.56
Moon Jae-inDemocratic United Party14,692,63248.02
Kang Ji-wonIndependent53,3030.17
Kim Soon-jaIndependent46,0170.15
Kim So-yeonIndependent16,6870.05
Park Jong-sunIndependent12,8540.04
Total30,594,621100.00
Valid votes30,594,62199.59
Invalid/blank votes126,8380.41
Total votes30,721,459100.00
Registered voters/turnout40,507,84275.84
Source: National Election Commission

By region

Major candidates

Breakdown of votes by region for candidates with at least 1% of the total votes.

Region Park Geun-hye Moon Jae-in
Votes % Votes %
Seoul 3,024,572 48.2 3,227,639 51.4
Busan 1,324,159 59.8 882,511 39.9
Daegu 1,267,789 80.1 309,034 19.5
Incheon 852,600 51.6 794,213 48.0
Gwangju 69,574 7.8 823,737 92.0
Daejeon 450,576 50.0 448,310 49.7
Ulsan 413,977 59.8 275,451 39.8
Sejong 33,587 51.9 30,787 47.6
Gyeonggi 3,528,915 50.4 3,442,084 49.2
Gangwon 562,876 62.0 340,870 37.5
North Chungcheong 518,442 56.2 398,907 43.3
South Chungcheong 658,928 56.7 497,630 43.3
North Jeolla 150,315 13.2 980,322 86.3
South Jeolla 116,296 10.0 1,038,347 89.3
North Gyeongsang 1,375,164 80.8 316,659 18.6
South Gyeongsang 1,259,174 63.1 724,896 36.3
Jeju 166,184 50.5 161,235 49.0
Total 15,773,128 51.6 14,692,632 48.0
Source: National Election Commission

Minor candidates

Breakdown of votes by region for candidates with less than 1% of the total votes.

Region Kang
Ji-won
Kim
Soon-ja
Kim
So-yeon
Park
Jong-sun
Seoul 11,829 5,307 3,793 3,559
Busan 2,878 2,389 913 555
Daegu 2,043 1,984 624 366
Incheon 2,730 1,910 1,005 508
Gwangju 1,113 561 333 268
Daejeon 1,291 969 461 271
Ulsan 898 1,463 434 210
Sejong 99 155 38 31
Gyeonggi 12,577 7,476 3,674 1,997
Gangwon 1,514 2,114 524 356
North Chungcheong 1,511 2,241 542 410
South Chungcheong 1,976 3,198 688 516
North Jeolla 3,066 1,690 702 480
South Jeolla 4,338 2,487 759 732
North Gyeongsang 2,119 5,886 873 810
South Gyeongsang 2,654 5,326 1,084 1,637
Jeju 667 861 240 148
Total 53,303 46,017 16,687 12,854
Source: National Election Commission


NIS interference

Public opinion manipulation controversy

On 11 December 2012, the Democratic United Party claimed that agents of the Psychological Operations group in the South Korean National Intelligence Service (NIS) were influencing public opinion under orders by the NIS, by posting comments on the Internet. They followed these claims by identifying one such agent. In a police raid, that agent did not emerge from the rented office and claimed that she was not involved in such actions. Right after the last TV debate between candidates Park Geun-Hye and Moon Jae-in, police announced that no evidence was found. After Park Geun-Hye was sworn into office, evidence emerged that the agent in question and many others were involved in activities manipulating public opinion in the presidential election. On 27 May 2013 the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency and Seoul Suseo Police Station was found to have delayed delivering evidence, and turned in fabricated laptop hard drive analysis reports. The police already had evidence that the agent in question posted political comments, the analysis report was not submitted to the Suseo Police Station and was destroyed.

In 2013, prosecutor Yoon Seok-youl led a special investigation team that looked into the National Intelligence Service (NIS)'s involvement in the scandal. Yoon sought the prosecution of the former head of the NIS, Won Sei-hoon for violating the Public Official Election Act for his role in the case. Yoon accused Park Geun-hye's Justice Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn of influencing his investigation. In February 2015, Won was convicted on charges of instructing NIS officials to manipulate internet comments and sentenced to three years in prison. However the conviction was overturned on appeal, leading to a retrial. In a second trial, Won was sentenced to four years in prison in 2017. The Supreme Court upheld the sentence in April 2018. When Moon Jae-in won the 2017 election, his administration pursued nine additional charges of political interference against Won, resulting in a subsequent 7 year jail sentence in 2020.

In August 2017, the NIS formally acknowledged that it was involved in the election manipulation after an internal inquiry. In December 2020, the National Assembly passed reforms curbing powers of the NIS, explicitly banning the agency and its employees from interfering in domestic politics.

Interference with overseas voters

In June 2021, according to a MBC News report, Won Sei-hoon pushed South Korean embassies abroad to delay issuing new passports to Korean nationals, who tend to lean liberal in order to limit their ability to vote for Moon Jae-in. A NIS whistleblower also claimed that he was tortured after objecting to the operation by being placed for several days in a small white room intended to cause sensory disorientation.


This page was last updated at 2024-02-18 11:56 UTC. Update now. View original page.

All our content comes from Wikipedia and under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.


Top

If mathematical, chemical, physical and other formulas are not displayed correctly on this page, please useFirefox or Safari