CINA

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Today's S. Korean media (Yonhap etc..) reported - in connection with the coming presidential election - about a very critical (or just crazy..) development in the workers' movement, at least in the reformist part of the movement: Almost 70 percent of the KFTU (Korean Federation of Trade Unions) members will - probably - vote for one extreme conservative, respectively reactionary (Lee Myung-bak & Lee Hoi-chang) candidate of the ruling exploiter, i.e. capitalist class. (Opps.. Simply said, they must be complete "brain amputated"!!)

Labor Union Endorses Conservative Frontrunner Lee for President (K. Times)
 

Lee Myung-bak, the conservative front-runner for this month's presidential election, received a rare endorsement Sunday from one of South Korea's two umbrella labor unions that have traditionally sided with the liberals.

Lee of the main opposition Grand National Party is poised to win the Dec. 19 vote, with his approval rating having surged several percentage points to well over 40 percent after prosecutors cleared him of allegations of involvement in a major financial fraud.

The Federation of Korean Trade Unions, the less militant of South Korea's two umbrella labor organizations, said that in a recent opinion survey of its members, Lee was picked as the most favored among three major candidates. It's the first time South Korea's labor body has thrown its support behind the candidate of
the conservative party that has sided with conglomerates.

The endorsement seemed even more unusual because Lee was often accused of suppressing labor activity when he was the chief executive of Hyundai Construction and Engineering from the late 1970s to the early 1990s.

In the Dec. 1-7 survey, 41.5 percent picked Lee as their favorite over liberal Chung Dong-young of the pro-government United New Democratic Party who garnered a 31 percent approval rating. The least popular was rightwing independent Lee Hoi-chang, a former GNP chairman and the party's two-time standard-bearer. He earned a 27.5 percent approval rating, the union said in a statement.

Survey workers contacted 505,700 members of the nationwide union by telephone, and 236,600 people responded, the union said.

The Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, South Korea's other labor umbrella organization, has yet to take an official stance on candidates. (*)

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2007/12/116_15189.html

* Until now KCTU - at least the leadership - is agitating for the election of Kwon Young-ghil, DLP's "Workers' President" candidate.