Who are ‘unfabulous’ 5?

The Dec. 19 presidential election is not all about top two candidates, Park Geun-hye and Moon Jae-in who are in a neck-and-neck race after Ahn Cheol-soo bowed out last week.

There are “five others” in the presidential race, some of them are obscure figures little-known to the general public. The five completed their registration as candidates to the National Election Commission on Monday.

Lee Jung-hee of the Unified Progressive Party (UPP), a former lawmaker, is probably the most recognized figure among them. The former co-chair of the UPP, along with her aides, was embroiled in an election fraud scandal ahead of the April general elections, which led to her resignation from the leadership in May.

In September, the lawyer-turned-politician officially announced her presidential bid and has repeatedly said she was prepared to do anything if that can prevent the ruling Saenuri Party from winning the presidential election again.

Independent candidate Kang Ji-won, a lawyer who earned the nickname “guardian of teenagers” for his dedication to preventing juvenile delinquency, also joined the race. He is quite a well-known figure as well.

In an exclusive interview with The Korea Times earlier this year, he said that “I decided to enter the presidential race in order to counter a lack of focus on core issues such as improving people’s livelihood or the nation’s competitiveness in the election race.”

Two female candidates from the labor sector joined the presidential race as candidates as well.

One of them is Kim So-yeon, former head of the Kiryung Electronics chapter of the Korean Metal Workers’ Union and is currently a member of the activist group. Kim said she joined the presidential race in order to create a whole new world to eliminate the practice of recruiting contract-based workers with precarious working conditions.

She said she declared her bid to join the presidential election because she wanted to demonstrate that workers can play a pivotal role in the political arena and they don’t need to seek out help from somebody else to make their voice heard in public policy.

The other candidate is Kim Soon-ja who specified her job as a cleaning laborer. Indeed, she worked as a street sweeper before she ran as the New Progressive Party’s (NPP) ticket on the proportional representation system in the general election.

She vowed to create a society where workers like her can have self-esteem and feel happy.

Former businessman Park Jong-seon also completed his registration as a candidate. Park, 84, is the oldest candidate among the candidates. He said he unsuccessfully ran in the general election in Namhae-Hadong in South Gyeongsang Province in 1992.

Meanwhile, Progressive Justice Party candidate Shim Sang-jung renounced her candidacy to ally with the main opposition DUP.

The total number of candidates registered as candidates for the December presidential election is smaller than that of five years ago which was 12.

But the lineup of the 2012 presidential election showed a surge of female candidates. Female candidates outnumbered male counterparts, which is unprecedented. <The Korea Times/Jun Ji-hye>