Coalition Loses To Opposition In Election, South Korean President Yoon Promises Government Reform

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeo/PHOTO via Instagram @sukyeol.yoon

JAKARTA - South Korea's opposition camp won the country's legislative election and defeated the government coalition of the People's Power Party (PPP) in support of President Yoon Suk-yeo.

The Democratic Party, as South Korea's main opposition party, and its allied party won a total of 176 of the 300 seats in the South Korean National Assembly, while PPP and its allied party, the People's Future Party, won only 108 seats, Yonhap reported as saying by ANTARA, Friday, April 12.

President Yoon acknowledged the defeat of his coalition and called himself accepting the people's choice.

"I will accept the people's choice in this general election with humility, and I will fight to reform the government and work hard to realize economic stability and improve the quality of life of the people," said Yoon.

As a form of responsibility for the defeat in the election, PPP leader Han Dong-hoon expressed his resignation from his position. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Han Duck-soo and other senior presidential staff also submitted their resignations.

The local general election commission stated that 67 percent of the 44.28 million voters exercised their voting rights in this election, thus becoming the election with the highest number of voters in 32 years.

The percentage of voters in the 2020 election only reached 66.2 percent, and the highest percentage was recorded in the 1992 election, of which 71.9 percent of voters exercised their voting rights.

Meanwhile, more than 31 percent of voters, equivalent to 13.84 million out of 44.28 million voters, have voted in the initial voting period which lasted two days and ended Saturday (6/4).

This makes the 2024 election the first South Korean election with more than 30 percent of voters voting during the initial voting period. The number of voters in the initial vote in the 2020 election only reached 24.95 percent.

In the previous elections in 2020, the DP and its allied parties won 180 seats, while the United Future Party -- the old name PPP -- and its allied parties won only 103 seats.