By Lee Tae-hoon
Rep. Moon Jae-in, the leading presidential hopeful of the main opposition party, grabbed his 11th straight win Wednesday in the liberal party’s latest presidential primary.
The lawyer-turned-politician won 10,275 votes, or 56.9 percent of the 18,048 ballots cast in the regional primary election for the relatively neutral Daegu-North Gyeongsang region.
This has led his overall tally to 50.8 percent, up from 50.4 percent, raising prospects that Moon will become the standard bearer for the Democratic United Party (DUP) without a run-off election.
A run-off will be held if none of the four contenders receives more than half of all votes cast.
Thus far, former DUP party leader Sohn Hak-kyu has won 23.1 percent of the vote, followed by former South Gyeongsang Province Governor Kim Doo-kwan with 18.4 percent and another former DUP chief Chung Sye-kyun with 7.6 percent.
Analysts say Moon will likely sweep the remaining primary elections to be held in the nation’s two most populous regions of Gyeonggi Province and Seoul.
Of 1.08 million people registered to take part in the DUP primary, nearly 530,000 people live in the capital areas.
They point out that the first-term lawmaker is enjoying growing popularity after polls found that he has a good chance of defeating Ahn Cheol-soo, the medical doctor-turned-IT mogul, if the latter throws his hat in to the race to select a united liberal candidate.
“The results in the primary so far show that the public not only wants a new government, but a changed world," Moon, a former chief of staff to the late President Roh Moo-hyun, said.
The DUP will hold the primary for Gyeonggi Province on Saturday and for Seoul the following day.
If Moon fails to secure the majority of the vote, he will likely face a run-off with either Sohn or Kim on Sept. 23