On the 10th of March, Yoon Seok-yeol became the 20th president of South Korea.

The presidential election was held on 9th of  March and votes were counted all night, with  some news outlets broadcasting  the voting cast in real-time throughout the morning.

The election, which was one of the most controversial ones to date, was very fierce.

With candidate Lee Jae-myung leading by 12:30 on the 10th, the tables were turned in a matter of seconds.

Yoon Seok-yeol reversed Lee Jae-myung by 48.36% while Lee’s vote was about 48.26%. 

The vote counting rate had been reversed again, but as it exceeded 51.05%, Yoon Seok-yeol  immediately reversed the vote once more , mounting tension in the vote counting.

Eventually, around 6:20 a.m. on the 10th, candidate Yoon became the winner of the 20th presidential election in South Korea by a slight shade of difference.

Yoon’s vote rate was about 48.56% while that of candidate Lee-Jae-myung of the Democratic Party of Korea had a strikingly close  47.83%.

Through the pre-voting, it was widely predicted  that Lee would win the election, but an unexpected change  occurred.

Ahn Cheol-soo from People’s Party was placing 3rd place, but he unified with Yoon who was in 2nd place. 

With this unification, public opinion predicted that Yoon Seok-yeol would win the election by a big margin.

However, results showed that  their prophecy was  totally wrong.

The difference between  Yoon and Lee’s voting rates was only about 0.73%. 

However, by almost accurately matching the votes of candidate Lee and candidate Yoon, the three terrestrial broadcasters showed an amazing hit rate.  

The election became an issue because there were more invalid votes than the difference in the number of votes between the two candidates.

There were about 310,000 invalid votes, achieving the all-time invalidity vote among the previous elections for the Korean president.

It was the first election where a person born in the 21st century exercised their right to vote in South Korea.

Due to the Act on the Opening of the Public Election Act passed  in 2019, this age of eligible voters for this election was  from the age of 18, who were born before the 10th of March, 2004.  

In addition , as there was a big obstacle called Covid-19, the voting procedures this year  differed from  other elections held previously in South Korea.

This difference is due to the existence of a  separate polling station that has been opened for Covid patients who can not vote due to the quarantine.

The government claimed that people who are in quarantine are allowed to go out for the election; however, they had to vote between 6:00 p.m to 7:30 p.m.

Meanwhile, Yoon Seok-yeol, who resigned as the 43rd Prosecutor General, has run for president nine months after joining the People's Power in July 2021. Yoon, the winner of this election, is scheduled to take office as president on May 10, 2022. 

As the election was intense and gave rise to  a number of  issues, many people are attentive to Yoon Seok-yeol's future activities as president.

Saemi Namgung

Grade 11

Fayston Preparatory School