Click to view full size

Lib­er­al can­di­date Lee Jae-myung is fore­cast to win South Ko­rea’s snap pres­i­den­tial elec­tion, a joint ex­it poll on Tues­day showed, two months af­ter his archri­val and then con­ser­v­a­tive Pres­i­dent Yoon Suk Yeol was re­moved from of­fice over his short-lived im­po­si­tion of mar­tial law.

The ex­it poll by South Ko­rea’s three ma­jor TV sta­tions -– KBS, MBC and SBS -– showed Lee pro­ject­ed to ob­tain 51.7% of the to­tal votes cast, beat­ing con­ser­v­a­tive can­di­date Kim Moon Soo on 39.3%.

Pre-elec­tion sur­veys al­so sug­gest­ed Lee ap­peared head­ed for an easy win, rid­ing on deep pub­lic frus­tra­tion over the con­ser­v­a­tives in the wake of Yoon’s mar­tial law de­ba­cle. Kim has strug­gled to win over mod­er­ate, swing vot­ers as his Peo­ple Pow­er Par­ty re­mains in a quag­mire of in­ter­nal feud­ing over how to view Yoon’s ac­tions.