South Korea’s liberal candidate Lee holds clear lead a week before presidential vote

(Reuters)

SEOUL, May 27 – South Korea’s liberal frontrunner for president Lee Jae-myung was leading his main conservative rival Kim Moon-soo by more than 10 percentage points in an opinion poll issued on Tuesday, though the race had tightened a week ahead of the election.

The deeply polarised country holds a snap election on June 3 to pick a successor to ousted leader Yoon Suk Yeol, whose brief martial law imposition heightened long-simmering political disputes and sparked massive nationwide protests.

The next leader will have to mend the reputation of a country that transitioned from dictatorship to a democratic success story in the 1980s while spurring stalled growth, managing uncertain U.S. trade policies and dealing with nuclear-armed North Korea.

The Democratic Party candidate Lee, who has advocated using fiscal policy to support the economy and bringing to justice anyone involved in Yoon’s botched attempt to declare martial law in December, had 49% public support against Kim of the People Power Party with 35%, the Gallup Korea poll showed.

Kim has eroded what was a more than 20 percentage point gap with Lee at the start of the campaign on May 12, but has failed to convince another conservative candidate – New Reform Party’s Lee Jun-seok – to drop out and back him to improve his chances.

Yoon was ousted on April 4 by the Constitutional Court after he was impeached and is on trial on insurrection charges accused of trying to arrest Lee and others who repeatedly clashed with him while in office.

Third-party candidate Lee Jun-seok had 11%, according to the poll, which was one of the last major surveys to be published before a week-long blackout period that begins on Wednesday, when new polls are banned from publication by law.

Asia’s fourth-largest economy contracted in the first quarter as exports and consumption stalled, amid fears over the impact of Washington’s aggressive tariffs and political turmoil at home.

South Korea has been in trade talks with the United States and is seeking a waiver from the tariffs President Donald Trump announced as his administration pressures Seoul to resolve a large trade imbalance between the partners.