A unified candidate - Ahn or Oh?

By Park Moo-jong

"Unexpected" by-elections in the nation's two largest cities, Seoul and Busan, are expected to serve as a crucial barometer of public opinion ahead of the next presidential poll slated for March 9, 2022.

The rare by-elections on April 7 in the capital city of Seoul and the largest port city of Busan are the shameful products of the mayors' sexual harassment scandals. Coincidentally, the two disgraced mayors are from the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK).

Seoul Mayor Park Won-soon committed suicide last July just after his alleged sexual harassment of his secretary was made public, while Busan Mayor Oh Keo-don resigned last April after admitting his sexual harassment of a city official and is now standing trial.

Now, let's see how the wind blows.

In the largest port city of Busan, Park Heong-joon from the opposition People Power Party (PPP) is taking a comfortable lead over the ruling DPK's Kim Young-choon despite the Moon Jae-in administration's apparent pork-barreling decision to build a new Busan international airport on Gadeok Island.

Thus, the public concern is focused on Seoul with its population of 10 million, one fifth of the nation's total population of around 50 million, and notably on whether the opposition forces can field a unified candidate.

Ahn Cheol-soo of the People's Party (PP) or Oh Se-hoon of the PPP? Or will both run against ruling party contender Park Young-sun in a three-party contest?

The latest various polls found that a unified candidate, either Ahn or Oh, would defeat Park in a two-way race and Ahn will win more comfortably. But in a three-way competition Park would easily take up the post vacated by her late comrade.

Ahn and Oh started negotiations early this month to consolidate their candidacies to meet the "desperate" wish of the people opposing the Moon administration and ruling camp, pledging to strike a deal no later than March 19.

Both Ahn and Oh share "painful and shameful" careers.

Ahn, 59, a former physician, professor and businessman, jumped into politics 10 years ago to run in the by-election for Seoul mayor on Oct. 26, 2011, which was held after then Mayor Oh resigned for losing a referendum on a plan to offer free lunch to students.

Once the darling of the nation's youths and a great role model as the founder of AhnLab, an antivirus software company, Ahn was a strong favorite to win the by-election as an independent but the political novice finally made a concession to (the late) Park Won-soon as the unified candidate of the opposition camp.

Thanks to Ahn's concession, Park Won-soon won the by-election against Na Kyung-won, who lost to Oh in the PPP's candidacy for the by-election this time. Park continued his winning spree by sweeping the 2014 and 2018 elections, but took his own life after his former secretary made a complaint against him for sexual harassment.

Just a year later, Ahn announced his bid to run in the 2012 presidential election to meet public demand for "new politics" against Park Geun-hye from the majority Saenuri Party.

At one point, he had appeared stronger in public polls than Moon Jae-in, but on Nov. 23, he quit the race to throw his support behind Moon, the then-minority Democratic United Party candidate who ultimately lost to Park in the Dec. 19 election.

Oh, 60, a popular TV celebrity as a lawyer, became a lawmaker in 2000 as a then ruling party member. Engineered by his fresh image as a 45-year-old politician, Oh was elected Seoul mayor in 2006 and was reelected in 2010.

But one year later in 2011 after his reelection, he made an imprudent pledge that he would quit, if he lost a referendum he proposed on the then controversial plan to give free lunch to high school students against his policy. He lost and lost the coveted post.

Five years later, Oh resumed politics to run in the Jongno constituency against Chung Se-kyun (now prime minister from the ruling DPK) in the 2016 general election to no avail. He suffered another setback in last year's election in Gwangjin District by losing to 41-year-old political novice Ko Min-jung, a former KBS announcer and Moon's spokeswoman.

And he made a "brilliant" comeback as a PPP candidate for the by-election for the top post of Seoul that he threw away 10 years ago to the lamentation of conservatives.

Crossing the Rubicon River on Jan. 10, 49 B.C., Julius Caesar said, "The die is cast." Yet, the die has not yet been cast in Seoul. The fate of the Seoul by-election depends on whether the opposition forces, PPP and PP, will field a single candidate, Ahn or Oh, against the ruling camp's Park.

Various public polls show the opposition parties are destined to lose unless they field a unified candidate, while the ruling camp is in a serious situation due to the public anger over the alleged real estate speculation by officials of the government and state-run Korea Land and Housing Corporation (LH).

A failure caused by the two candidates' and parties' selfish political interests will make the crucial and thrilling contest a very dull event, costing the political careers of the two. So many people are concerned about whether Ahn or Oh will have a chance to redeem their earlier mistakes.

Park Moo-jong (emjei29@gmail.com) is a standing adviser of The Korea Times. He served as the president-publisher of the nation's first English daily newspaper from 2004 to 2014 after working as a reporter since 1974.