Moon visits Gunsan Shipyard, PPP cries political foul

President Moon Jae-in gives a speech at the Hyundai Heavy Industry's Gunsan Shipyard in Gunsan, North Jeolla, to mark the shipbuilder's plan to reopen the facility next year. [YONHAP]

With less than two weeks before the election to decide his successor, President Moon Jae-in on Thursday made a rare visit to Gunsan, North Jeolla, and promised major support in recovering the city's shipbuilding industry.

Moon attended a ceremony for Hyundai Heavy Industries' plan to reopen its shipyard in Gunsan. "Resumption of the operation of Gunsan Shipyard will revive the economy of the city as well as of North Jeolla," Moon said.

Hyundai Heavy Industries shut down its Gunsan Shipyard in July 2017 due to a slump in the global shipbuilding industry. Now, the facility is scheduled to reopen next January.

Although 11 months still remain until the reopening, Moon hosted the ceremony to celebrate the shipyard's revival, prompting speculations that his visit is a political one in support of the ruling Democratic Party (DP)'s presidential candidate Lee Jae-myung.

In the March 9 presidential election, Lee is competing against a strong conservative frontrunner, Yoon Suk-yeol of the People Power Party (PPP). Unlike the conservative candidates of the past, Yoon is recording unusually high support from within the Honam region, the ruling party's political stronghold. Honam refers to the area consisting of Gwangju and North and South Jeolla provinces.

While Lee is still managing to come out on top in Honam in opinion polls, Yoon's scores are higher than previous candidates of the conservative opposition party. According to an Embrain Public poll, commissioned by the JoongAng Ilbo and conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday, Yoon scored 13.2 percent in the Honam region.

In Gallup Korea's poll conducted last week, Yoon recorded 18 percent in the region, up by 12 percentage points from the previous week. In another survey by Research View conducted Feb. 15 to 17, 56 percent of the Honam voters said they support Lee, while 33 percent said they support Yoon.

More details of the polls are available on the National Election Survey Deliberation Commission homepage.

The PPP campaign is sanguine about Yoon's popularity in the Honam region. PPP Chairman Lee Jun-seok said Friday that the party will work toward winning 30 percent of the vote in Honam.

Since the introduction of the current presidential election system in 1987, Park Geun-hye recorded the highest popularity in Honam among all conservative candidates. In the 2012 presidential election, she won 10.5 percent of the votes cast from the region. She scored 7.8 percent in Gwangju, 10 percent in South Jeolla and 13.4 percent in North Jeolla.

This month alone, Yoon made three visits to the Honam region to appeal to the voters who have traditionally supported the DP.

But the PPP cried foul Thursday, criticizing Moon for violating political neutrality with his Gunsan visit.

"The Blue House insisted that Moon was trying to look after the people's livelihoods, but it was a visit to secure votes in the ruling party's home ground," said Rep. Her Eun-a, chief spokeswoman of the PPP. "When President Park visited Daegu and Busan before the 2016 legislative elections, the DP condemned her for intervening in the election. Unless that standard has changed, Moon's visit to Gunsan deserves to be called an attempt to influence the election."

Her said it was not the first time that Moon acted to influence the election. "Immediately after the DP's primary, Moon invited candidate Lee to the Blue House. Recently, he expressed strong anger toward PPP candidate Yoon and demanded an apology," she said.

"The latest visit to Gunsan made it clear that Moon is abusing his unusually high approval rating to influence the public sentiment."

The Blue House on Thursday stressed that Moon had no political intention. "The government must support Hyundai Heavy Industries' important decision, and Moon has repeatedly paid his attention to the shipyard," said a presidential aide. "Moon had also promised to visit the shipyard when it reopens. We will continue our work until the last day of this administration."

BY SER MYO-JA [ser.myoja@joongang.co.kr]