Jung Cheong-rae Takes 1st Place in 'PK' Regional Primary... Clash Over 'Shincheonji Allegations'

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As regional primaries are underway to elect the Democratic Party's new leadership, candidate Jung Cheong-rae took first place in the rank-and-file party member voting in Busan, Ulsan, and South Gyeongsang Province. The party leadership candidates also engaged in a war of words over allegations of Shincheonji's involvement.

Reporter Park Yerim.

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In the rank-and-file party member voting for the Democratic Party's regional primary in Busan, Ulsan, and South Gyeongsang Province held yesterday (August 2), party leadership candidate Jung Cheong-rae took first place with 46.6 percent of the vote.

Candidate Kim Min-seok ranked second with 43.8 percent, while candidate Song Young-gil came in third with 9.5 percent.

In the Chungcheong region rank-and-file member voting the day before, candidate Kim led candidate Jung by a margin of just 303 votes. However, simply adding yesterday's results from the Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongnam region puts candidate Jung ahead of candidate Kim by a margin of about 1,200 votes.

For the Yeongnam region, where the number of Democratic Party members is relatively small, a 5 percent weight will be applied on the final day of the national convention, meaning the vote gap could widen further.

During their joint speeches, the three candidates engaged in a fierce war of words—mentioning allegations of Shincheonji's involvement and responsibility for local elections—and even brought up referring each other to the party's ethics committee.

[Song Young-gil / Democratic Party Leadership Candidate : Looking at writer Yu Si-min's such curses through the eyes of the Buddha, why are fellow candidates attacking?]

[Jung Cheong-rae / Democratic Party Leadership Candidate : Candidate Kim Min-seok, who put the party at risk of being unconstitutional due to (Shincheonji allegations), must be referred to the ethics committee...]

[Kim Min-seok / Democratic Party Leadership Candidate : I will make sure that those who engaged in wrong factional behavior face judgment by the ethics committee.]

However, with primaries in other regions such as Honam and the metropolitan area still remaining, and with delegate votes and opinion poll results to be tallied at the end, many variables still remain.

The results of the rank-and-file member voting for Supreme Council members in Busan, Ulsan, and Gyeongnam showed Choi Min-hee, Park Sun-won, Han Min-soo, Seo Mi-hwa, and Kim Yong ranking first through fifth respectively, matching the ranking from the Chungcheong region voting results the day before.

Among them, candidates Choi Min-hee and Han Min-soo are classified as so-called pro-Jung, while candidates Park Sun-won, Seo Mi-hwa, and Kim Yong are classified as pro-Lee.

(Photo: Yonhap News)
Reported by Oh Young-chun and Shin Dong-hwan | Video Editing by Jang Hyun-ki
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.