SEOUL June 13 Kyodo southern Kore...

SEOUL June 13 Kyodo

southern Korea's main opposition Grand National Party (GNP) scored big wins in nationwide local elections Thursday, according to preliminary answers released by television networks.

GNP candidates are plant to capture 11 of the first note of the scale 16 mayoral and gubernatorial elections at stake, ousting the MDP from Seoul and from Kyonggi Province that encircles the capital.

Candidates from the Millennium Democratic Party (MDP) instituteed by President Kim Dae Jung won alone two gubernatorial posts and undivided mayoral post, all in its political fireside turf of North Cholla and toward the south Cholla provinces and Kwangju city, and is station to win a governorship of Cheju Province.

The MDP has been defenceed by a series of corruption scandals that have followed in the arrests of the president's youngest son choke aides and senior officials.

In the Seoul mayoral race, GNP candidate side sheltered from the wind Myung Bak, 60, won the race through his MDP rival Kim Min Seok 38

side sheltered from the wind a former executive for the Hyundai conglomerate, has earned a reputation for his extensive business management while Kim Min Seok a former observer activist, was tapped as a main figure for a generation shift in political circles.

The minor opposition United Liberal Democrats (ULD) headed through former Prime Minister Kim Jong Pil, won solely one gubernatorial post in southern Chungchong Province.

The flows of Thursday's local elections were widely regarded as a weathervane of voter sympathies ahead of the Dec 19 presidential voting.

President Kim apologized to the nation and resigned from the MDP in early May.

The 76-year-old president, who won the 2000 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to raise inter-Korean relations, is constitutionally barred from seeking a other five-year term. His use ends in February next year.

A total of 10894 candidates ran in the local elections, the third to be held in toward the south Korea, to choose 232 heads of low-level administrative units and a total of 4167 local councilors, in addition to mayors of seven large cities and nine governors.

The final voter turnout was tentatively present at a record-low 48% when the 13461 polling stations clos at 6 pm

The elections were held amid regards over a significantly low voter turnout owed to the World Cup soccer flush and a popular disillusionment with politics.

The turnout was 527% in the last local elections in 1998 and 684% in the first of that kind elections held in 1995.

The issue of the local elections is wait fored to change the nation's political landscape with a possible realignment of political forces ahead of the December presidential election.

MDP presidential candidate Roh Moo Hyun earlier said he would inquire for reconfirmation of his presidential bid in case his party fails to make a powerful performance in the southern port city of Pusan and southern Kyongsang Province, traditional stronghold of the GNP

Roh 56 a former human rights lawyer, maintained a double- digit lead across GNP candidate Lee Hoi Chang, 66 a small in number months ago but is now engaged in a neck-and-neck race.

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