SEOUL, March 6 (UPI) -- South Koreans becoming more conservative apparently largely as a result of President Roh Moo-hyun's unpopular left-leaning policies, a survey showed on Tuesday. The poll also indicated South Koreans are likely to elect a conservative flag-bearer in the presidential election slated for December, ending a ten-year-long reformist government.
When Roh was elected in late 2002 on a strong wave of anti-Americanism sparked by the deaths of two girls in a road accident by a U.S. military vehicle, South Korea was swept by progressive forces and North Korea sympathizers.
Roh's predecessor, Kim Dae-jung, won the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to improve long-frigid relations with North Korea and promote democracy and human rights. He ventured into North Korea in 2000 for the first inter-Korean summit, which sparked an unprecedented reconciliation and unification fever on the divided Korean peninsula.
After four years of Roh's leftist ruling, however, more and more South Koreans have lined up for conservatives and anti-communist platforms, according to a poll made jointly by Gallup Korea and Seoul's largest newspaper, Chosun Ilbo.
The survey shows some 32 percent of South Koreans are conservative, up from 21 percent in 2003 when Roh took office. The surveys have been conducted every year to measure the public's ideological temper since 2002.
Some 84 percent of those polled are opposed to unconditional economic aid to North Korea, up from 77 percent last year, posing a burden on Roh's much-touted policy of engaging the communist neighbor. In 2003, some 67 percent were opposed to unconditional aid. Only 13 percent this year are in favor of unconditional aid to the famine-hit North, down from 27 percent four years ago.
The toughening stance toward the North was largely caused by Pyongyang's missile tests in July followed by a nuclear weapon test in October, which have sharply raised military tensions on the peninsula, survey experts say.
Reflecting the public opinion, the Seoul government has recently tried to link its economic aid to progress at the multilateral talks on ending the North's nuclear drive.
During the high-level talks with the North last week, the South refused Pyongyang's call for immediate shipment of rice aid, saying it would resume aid only after the communist country takes steps to dismantle its nuclear facilities as agreed in the Feb. 13 deal. The South had suspended its annual aid of 500,000 tons of rice and 350,000 tons of fertilizer after the North's missile tests in July.
In another indication of South Koreans' changing ideological standing, 61 percent of those polled said the country's anti-communist National Security Law should be maintained to cope with lingering threats from North Korea, up from 56 percent in 2003.
Roh and his reformist party, backed by human rights groups, have long led a campaign to scrap the half-century-old security law, calling it an anachronism harking back to the Cold War period.
But the conservative forces and anti-North Korea groups have opposed moves to kill the law, saying it is still necessary to safeguard South Korea's liberal democracy from the North's never-ending schemes to cause chaos in the South.
The National Security Law dates back to 1948 as a Cold War era bulwark against communism. Under the law, a South Korean could be sentenced to prison if convicted of praising an "anti-state organization," which refers to North Korea. It also prohibits the country's citizens from unauthorized contact with North Koreans or products from the communist country.
The survey also showed some 60 percent of South Koreans are in favor of growth-oriented policies, blaming Roh's left-leaning economic policy focused on fair distribution of wealth and more spending for social welfare, up from 49 percent in 2003.
According to other polls, more than 70 percent of South Koreans expect the country's opposition and conservative Grand National Party to take power in December's presidential election.
