PPP's Kwon Young-se takes Yongsan over DP's Kang Tae-woong

Democratic Party candidate Kang Tae-woong, left, and Peoople Power Party candidate Kwon Yong-se speak during their election campaign for the seat in Yongsan District on Monday. [NEWS1]

Rep. Kwon Young-se of the People Power Party (PPP) came out as the winner against Democratic Party (DP) candidate Kang Tae-woong in Yongsan District in a nail-biter of a race for one of Seoul’s most crucial districts.

Kwon won 51.77 percent of the votes, while Kang won 47.02 percent, as the two traded first and second places throughout the count into the early hours of Thursday.

Voter turnout in Yongsan, where the presidential office is located and where the two parties have been fighting fiercely, stood at 68.8 percent, according to the National Election Commission. At the center of the so-called “Han River Belt,” Yongsan is an area with a strong lean to the right, with conservative party candidates predominantly claiming election victory for the past 20 years.

But the DP has focused on winning the district by calling for judgment to be passed on the Yoon Suk Yeol administration through the election, putting forward Kang, who was defeated by just 890 votes in the last general election.

Kwon has faced criticism concerning the Itaewon crowd crush that took place on Halloween weekend two years ago, as he had backed the chief of the Yongsan District Office, Park Hee-young, and was known to be the first person Park reported the emergency to when the tragedy took place.

Bereaved families of the victims of the crowd crush held protests ahead of the general election last week, saying that the re-election of Kwon, whom they said has “political responsibility” for the tragedy, must be stopped at all costs.

A four-time lawmaker, he was previously ambassador to China between June 2013 to March 2015 under the Park Geun-hye administration and unification minister from May 2022 to July 2023 under the Yoon administration.

Kang, previously a public servant, entered politics in 2020 as a member of the DP.

The exit poll results released by the three terrestrial broadcasters KBS, SBS and MBC projected Kang to win with 50.3 percent of the votes to Kwon’s 49.3 percent.

The poll surveyed 359,750 voters at 1,980 polling stations nationwide as voting was underway, and had a 95-percent confidence interval with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 to 7.4 percentage points.

BY LIM JEONG-WON [lim.jeongwon@joongang.co.kr]