2004 South Korean legislative election

2004 South Korean legislative election

15 April 2004
All 299 seats in the National Assembly 150 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	60.63% (3.38pp; Const. votes) 60.63% (New; PR votes)
Majority party Minority party   Leader Chung Dong-young Park Geun-hye Party Uri Grand National Last election Did not exist 133 seats Seats won 152 121 Seat change New 12 Constituency vote 8,145,824 8,083,609 % and swing 41.99% (New) 37.90% (1.06pp) Regional vote 8,145,824 7,613,660 % and swing 38.27% (New) 35.77% (New)   Third party Fourth party   Leader Kwon Young-ghil Cho Soon-hyung Party Democratic Labor Millennium Democratic Last election 0 seats 115 seats Seats won 10 9 Seat change 10 106 Constituency vote 920,229 1,698,368 % and swing 4.31% (3.13pp) 7.09% (28.78pp) Regional vote 2,774,061 2,774,061 % and swing 13.03% (New) 7.96% (New)
Speaker before election Park Kwan-yong Grand National Elected Speaker Kim Won-ki Uri

Legislative elections were held in South Korea on 15 April 2004. In the 17th election for the National Assembly, voters elected 299 members of the legislature. The newly formed Uri Party and other parties supporting President Roh Moo-hyun, who was impeached by the outgoing National Assembly, won a majority of seats. This was the first time a centre-left liberal party won a majority in the National Assembly.

Electoral system

See also: Legislative elections in South Korea

The election was held under parallel voting, with 243 members elected in single-member constituencies via first-past-the-post voting and the remainder elected via proportional representation. Proportional seats were only available to parties which one three percent of the national valid vote among seat-allocated parties and/or won five or more constituency seats.

Political parties

See also: List of political parties in South Korea

Parties		Leader	Ideology	Seats		Status
				Last election	Before election
	Grand National Party	Park Geun-hye	Conservatism	133 / 273	139 / 273	Opposition
	Millennium Democratic Party	Cho Soon-hyung	Liberalism	115 / 273	59 / 273	Government (2000–2003)
						Opposition (2003–2004)
					49 / 273	Government (2003–2004)
	United Liberal Democrats	Kim Jong-pil	Conservatism	17 / 273	10 / 273	Governing coalition (2000–2001)
						Opposition (2001–2004)
	Democratic People's Party		Conservatism	2 / 273	1 / 273	Opposition
	New Korea Party of Hope		Conservatism	1 / 273	Dissolved

The newly formed liberal Uri Party (Uri-dang or Our Party) gained support through its opposition to the impeachment of President Roh. It won 32 out of 49 seats in Seoul, 44 out of 62 in Incheon and Gyeonggi, confirming that a majority of voters supported the President Roh.

The conservative Grand National Party, which supported the impeachment of President Roh, suffered a loss of support, but won a majority in North Gyeongsang and South Gyeongsang regions and retained the 100 seats necessary to block constitutional changes.

The progressive, socialist Democratic Labor Party got 13.03% of vote share, but won only 10 out of 299 seats due to the FPTP system. However this was considered as a great triumph considering that political landscape of South Korea is traditionally anti-communist and against left-wing policies. DLP also won two FPTP seats in Ulsan based on the Hyundai labor union.

The Millennium Democratic Party, formerly the major liberal party, was the second-largest party prior to the election but sustained the biggest loss in the backlash following its leading role in the impeachment of Roh, as much of its support shifted to the Uri Party.

The United Liberal Democrats, a conservative regional party based on North Chungcheong and South Chungcheong regions, lost support since its leader, Kim Jong-pil, did not contest the last presidential election.

Results

Party		Proportional			Constituency			Total seats	+/–
		Votes	%	Seats	Votes	%	Seats
	Uri Party	8,145,824	38.27	23	8,957,665	41.99	129	152	New
	Grand National Party	7,613,660	35.77	21	8,083,609	37.90	100	121	–12
	Democratic Labor Party	2,774,061	13.03	8	920,229	4.31	2	10	+10
	Millennium Democratic Party	1,510,178	7.09	4	1,698,368	7.96	5	9	−106
	United Liberal Democrats	600,462	2.82	0	569,083	2.67	4	4	−13
	Christian Party	228,837	1.08	0	8,267	0.04	0	0	New
	National Integration 21	119,746	0.56	0	63,989	0.30	1	1	New
	Green Social Democrats	103,845	0.49	0	37,789	0.18	0	0	New
	Socialist Party	47,311	0.22	0	8,004	0.04	0	0	0
	Democratic Unity	39,785	0.19	0				0	New
	Labor Party	37,084	0.17	0	2,582	0.01	0	0	New
	Hope2080	31,501	0.15	0	1,253	0.01	0	0	New
	Democratic Republican Party	24,360	0.11	0	2,405	0.01	0	0	0
	Confederation of Nations	9,330	0.04	0	226	0.00	0	0	New
	Democratic People's Party				4,347	0.02	0	0	–2
	Independents				972,954	4.56	2	2	–3
Total		21,285,984	100.00	56	21,330,770	100.00	243	299	+26
Valid votes		21,285,984	98.63		21,330,770	98.84
Invalid/blank votes		295,566	1.37		250,174	1.16
Total votes		21,581,550	100.00		21,580,944	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		35,596,497	60.63		35,596,497	60.63
Source: NEC, IPU, CLEA

By city/province

Constituency results by city/provinces

Region	Uri		GNP		DLP		MDP		ULD		NI21	Ind.	Total seats
	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	Seats
Seoul	32	42.9	16	41.3	0	3.5	0	9.8	0	0.8	0	0	48
Busan	1	38.9	17	52.6	0	2.9	0	0.7	0	0.3	0	0	18
Daegu	0	26.8	12	62.4	0	2.6	0	1.8	0	0.5	0	0	12
Incheon	9	44.6	3	38.9	0	7.4	0	5.2	0	0.7	0	0	12
Gwangju	7	54.1	0	0.1	0	6.2	0	36.5	0	0.3	0	0	7
Daejeon	6	45.7	0	22.4	0	1.5	0	3.2	0	22.1	0	0	6
Ulsan	1	28.1	3	36.3	1	18.0	0	0.6	0	0.8	1	0	6
Gyeonggi	35	45.7	14	40.6	0	4.1	0	6.6	0	0.7	0	0	49
Gangwon	2	38.8	6	43.4	0	4.1	0	6.3	0	0.2	0	0	8
North Chungcheong	8	50.4	0	32.6	0	3.3	0	1.0	0	9.2	0	0	8
South Chungcheong	5	38.9	1	15.8	0	2.2	0	3.5	4	33.8	0	0	10
North Jeolla	11	64.5	0	0.1	0	4.5	0	18.6	0	0.1	0	0	11
South Jeolla	7	49.1	0	0.3	0	2.7	5	36.6	0	0.1	0	1	13
North Gyeongsang	0	25.8	14	54.6	0	3.4	0	0.4	0	0.6	0	1	15
South Gyeongsang	2	34.6	14	48.0	1	8.5	0	0.5	0	0.5	0	0	17
Jeju	3	49.4	0	40.2	0	3.4	0	3.8	0	0.6	0	0	3
Total	129	42.0	100	37.9	2	4.3	5	8.0	4	2.7	1	2	243

Party list vote results by city/provinces

Region	Uri	GNP	DLP	MDP	ULD	Other
Seoul	37.7	36.7	12.6	8.4	2.1	2.5
Busan	33.7	49.4	12.0	1.9	0.7	2.3
Daegu	22.3	62.1	11.6	1.1	0.8	2.2
Incheon	39.5	34.6	15.3	5.4	2.1	3.0
Gwangju	51.6	1.8	13.1	31.1	0.3	2.0
Daejeon	43.8	24.3	11.8	3.1	14.5	2.4
Ulsan	31.2	36.4	21.9	1.5	0.8	8.2
Gyeonggi	40.2	35.4	13.5	6.1	2.0	2.8
Gangwon	38.1	40.6	12.8	3.5	1.3	3.6
North Chungcheong	44.7	30.3	13.1	2.2	6.3	3.5
South Chungcheong	38.0	21.2	10.5	2.8	23.8	3.7
North Jeolla	67.3	3.4	11.1	13.6	1.0	3.6
South Jeolla	46.7	2.9	11.2	33.8	1.0	4.4
North Gyeongsang	23.0	58.3	12.0	1.4	1.2	4.1
South Gyeongsang	31.7	47.3	15.8	1.4	0.8	3.0
Jeju	46.0	30.8	14.1	5.1	1.1	2.9
Overall total	38.3	35.8	13.0	7.1	2.8	3.0
Seat allocation	23	21	8	4	0	0