'Squid Game Election': S. Korean campaign gets fierce

SEOUL－The race between South Korea's two leading presidential candidates has seen unprecedented levels of toxic rhetoric, mudslinging and lawsuits.

How bad is it?

"Hitler", "beast" and "parasite" are some of the choice insults leveled by both camps. Some are even calling it "The Squid Game Election", in reference to streaming service Netflix's megahit survival drama where people are killed if they lose children's games.

And the stakes? There is widespread speculation that the loser in this week's poll will be arrested.

"It's a dreadful presidential election when the losing contender faces prison. Please survive this dogfight in the mire!" wrote a senior opposition politician Hong Joonpyo on Facebook.

Lee Jae-myung from the liberal governing Democratic Party and Yoon Suk-yeol from the main conservative opposition People Power Party are locked in an extremely tight race for the election on Wednesday.

Their negative campaigns are aggravating South Korea's already severe political divide at a time when it faces a battered, pandemic-hit economy.

Opinion surveys show that both candidates have more critics than supporters.

"Isn't our national future too bleak with an unpleasant and bitter presidential election that calls for choosing the lesser of two evils?" wrote newspaper Dong-A Ilbo in an editorial.

Yoon has slammed Lee over his possible ties to an allegedly corrupt land development scandal. Lee has denied any connection, and in turn has tried to link Yoon to the same scandal.

There have also been attacks on the candidates' wives, both of whom have been forced to apologize over separate scandals.

Their campaign teams and supporters have filed dozens of lawsuits charging libel and the spread of false information among other issues.

Mutual hatred

"This year's presidential election has been more overwhelmed by negative campaigning than any other previous election, and the mutual hatred won't easily die down after the election," said Choi Jin, director of the Institute of Presidential Leadership in Seoul. Yoon is more popular with older voters and those in the southeastern region of Gyeongsang, where past conservative and authoritarian leaders came from.

Lee enjoys greater support from younger people and those from Jeolla Province, Gyeongsang's rival region in the southwest.

Many surveys showed Yoon has received greater approval ratings than Lee from voters aged 18 to 29, most of whom were born after South Korea became a developed country.

During a recent TV debate, Yoon and Lee agreed not to launch politically motivated investigations against the other side if they win. But some question their sincerity.

In a newspaper interview last month, Yoon said that if elected, his government would investigate the land development scandal that Lee has been allegedly linked to.

Cho Jinman, a professor at Seoul's Duksung Women's University, said a new president must exercise restraint and calm calls for political revenge by hard-line supporters.

"We now have an election race like Squid Game, but it will be a new president's responsibility to pull us out of it," he said.

Agencies via Xinhua