Seoul Mayoral Race: Jung Won-o Leads Oh Se-hoon by 11% – What This Means for Voters

Translation resultSeoul — Jung Won‑oh 43% · Oh Se‑hoon 32%; Busan — Jeon Jae‑su 42% · Park Heong‑joon 33%A poll released on the 15th, after candidate registration closed for the June 3 local elections, shows candidates from the Democratic Party leading their People Power Party rivals in the mayoral races in Seoul and Busan.Hankook Research conducted the poll for KBS from April 11–14. In Seoul, Democratic candidate Jung Won‑oh received 43% support, while People Power candidate Oh Se‑hoon received 32%. The 11‑point gap is outside the poll’s margin of error of ±3.5 percentage points. Support levels were unchanged from a KBS poll published on April 30. Thirteen percent said they had no preferred candidate, and 7% answered “don’t know/no response.”By subregion, only Gangnam East — which includes the three Gangnam districts — showed a close race: Jung 36% vs. Oh 44%, a margin within the subregional error range of ±7.4 percentage points. In the other Seoul districts, Jung led: Gangbuk West (46% vs. 25%), Gangbuk East (46% vs. 30%), and Gangnam West (44% vs. 31%).In Busan, the Democratic candidate also led. Jeon Jae‑su polled 42% to Park Heong‑joon’s 33%, a 9‑point advantage outside the ±3.5‑point margin of error. As in Seoul, support in Busan remained range‑bound compared with a KBS poll released at the end of April. Among voters who said they will definitely vote, Jeon led 50% to Park’s 35%.The survey used randomly generated virtual phone numbers and conducted telephone interviews with 800 eligible voters each in Seoul and Busan from April 11–14. Response rates were 13.6% in Seoul and 19.2% in Busan. The sampling error is ±3.5 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. For more details, see the National Election Survey Deliberation Commission website.