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| Next to empty polling booths, a voter fill in ballots at a polling station in Oksu-dong, Seongdong District, Seoul, Wednesday. Yonhap |
By Nam Hyun-woo
The total turnout for Wednesday's local elections was tentatively tallied at 50.9 percent, the lowest since the 2002 local elections, the election watchdog said.
According to the National Election Commission, a total of 22.57 million out of 44.3 million eligible voters had casted their ballots as of 7:30 p.m., Wednesday.
In the early voting period on Friday and Saturday, more than 9.13 million people voted to log a 20.62 percent turnout, which was 0.48 percentage points higher compared to four years earlier.
The turnout for Wednesday's local elections was 9.3 percentage points lower compared to the previous 2018 local elections which saw 60.2 percent.
The lowest turnout was recorded in 2002 when only 48.9 percent of eligible voters cast their ballots.
By region, Gwangju showed the lowest turnout of 37.7 percent in this year's local elections, while South Jeolla Province had the highest of 58.5 percent.
Pundits attributed the lower-than-expected turnout to the current political dynamics, young voters' indifference to politics and the timing of the local elections.
"Among Korea's nationwide elections, local elections have been the least politically engaged ones," said Eom Gyeong-yeong, director of the private political think tank Zeitgeist Institute.
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"Furthermore, polls have shown that the elections this time were already leaning towards a certain side before people actually cast their ballots. … Also, the local elections were held months after the presidential election. These factors paved the way for voter fatigue."
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| Tourists crowd a passenger terminal at Incheon International Airport, Wednesday. Yonhap |
Indifference to politics
Young voters' indifference to politics is also believed to be one of the reasons for Wednesday's relatively low turnout.
Since the mid-2010s, the younger generations have become more active in engaging in politics, with their turnouts for presidential, general and local elections growing each time.
According to Statistics Korea, the turnout of those aged between 20 and 25 in the 2018 local elections grew to 52.9 percent from the 51.4 percent seen in the 2014 local elections. Those aged between 25 and 30 also jumped to 51 percent from 45.1 percent during the same period.
However, this trend was stopped in its tracks starting with the by-elections to pick Seoul and Busan mayors in April 2021. In Seoul, the turnout of those aged between 20 and 25 stood at 48.6 percent, down 6.3 percentage points from that of the 2018 elections, and the number for those aged between 25 and 30 showed a sharper decline of 8.3 percentage points during the same period.
"It seems that those in their 20s and 30s are returning to political indifference. In the presidential election, fairness has become a topic of heated debate among the younger generation, but that did not result in a high turnout," Eom said.
"Since last year, young people have been showing a tendency of increased indifference about political ideology and partisanship and become more focused on actual interests for them. Against this backdrop, they are losing interest in political participation."
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