Yoon, Lee in dead heat in presidential race: poll

South Korea’s two leading presidential candidates are in a statistical dead heat, both with support ratings of around 35 percent, a poll showed Wednesday.

In a survey by Gallup Korea conducted on 1,001 adults on Monday and Tuesday, Yoon Suk-yeol of the main opposition People Power Party led Lee Jae-myung of the ruling Democratic Party with 36.1 percent to 34.9 percent.

The gap was within the margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points at a 95 percent confidence level.

Yoon gained 6.9 percentage points from the previous survey conducted from Jan. 3-4, while Lee lost 2.7 points.

The latest result reflects changed sentiment among voters in their 20s, with Yoon’s support in that age group rising from 15.6 percent to 29.1 percent and Lee’s approval falling from 27.2 percent to 23.3 percent.

Ahn Cheol-soo, the presidential candidate of the minor opposition People’s Party, came third with 13.5 percent, followed by Sim Sang-jeung of the minor progressive Justice Party at 3.9 percent.

In the hypothetical scenario of Yoon and Ahn merging candidacies and Yoon emerging as the unified candidate, Yoon had 42.5 percent support, followed by Lee with 39 percent and Sim with 9.1 percent.

With Ahn as the unified candidate, Ahn had 43.6 percent support, followed by Lee at 35.7 percent and Sim at 8.1 percent.