Legislative elections were held in

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...

on 12 April 1996. Dieter Nohlen, Florian Grotz & Christof Hartmann (2001) ''Elections in Asia: A data handbook, Volume II'', p420 The result was a victory for the

New Korea Party The New Korea Party (; NKP) was founded by the merging of Roh Tae-woo's Democratic Justice Party, Kim Young Sam Kim Young-sam (; or ; 20 December 1927 – 22 November 2015) was a South Korean politician and activist who served as t ...

, which won 139 of the 299 seats in the National Assembly. Voter turnout was 63.9%. Although the New Korea Party remained the largest party in the National Assembly, it failed to win the majority.

Political parties

The governing

(formerly the Democratic Liberal Party) of President

Kim Young-sam Kim Young-sam (; or ; 20 December 1927 – 22 November 2015) was a South Korean politician and activist who served as the seventh president of South Korea from 1993 to 1998. From 1961, he spent almost 30 years as one of the leaders of t ...

, lost its absolute parliamentary majority. The election was held three years into President Kim's five year mandate. The opposition

National Congress for New Politics The National Congress for New Politics (; NCNP) was a political party of South Korea. History The party was formed in 1995 as the National Congress for New Politics after Kim Dae-jung returned to active politics following his retirement in 1992 ...

was formed by veteran opposition leader

Kim Dae-jung Kim Dae-jung (; ; 6 January 192418 August 2009), was a South Korean politician and activist who served as the eighth president of South Korea from 1998 to 2003. He was a 2000 Nobel Peace Prize recipient for his work for democracy and human ...

and his supporters in the Democratic Party. Kim had retired from politics following his loss in the 1992 Presidential election but formed the new party after his return in 1995. The right-wing

United Liberal Democrats The United Liberal Democrats ( ko, 자유민주연합, Yayuminjuyeonhab, Liberal Democratic Union, ULD) was a right-wing conservative political party in South Korea, whose support mostly came from the North Chungcheong and South Chungcheong regi ...

was led by former

Prime Minister of South Korea The prime minister of the Republic of Korea (PMOTROK or PMOSK; ) is the deputy head of government and the second highest political office of South Korea who is appointed by the President of the Republic of Korea, with the National Assembly's app ...

Kim Jong-pil Kim Jong-pil (; ; January 7, 1926 – June 23, 2018), also known colloquially as JP, was a South Korean politician and the founder/first director of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA, now the National Intelligence Service). He s ...

, a former ally of President Kim. He had been a member of the former ruling Democratic Liberal Party but broke with it after Kim's victory in 1992. It joined with Kim Dae Jung's opposition and formed coalition. The United Democratic Party had once been the premier opposition party. It supported Kim Dae-jung's unsuccessful Presidential campaign in 1992 and was the largest opposition party in the outgoing

National Assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the rep ...

. However, following the defection of Kim and his supporters, the party was reduced to a minor force. It later merged to Kim Young-sam's party.

Results

By city or province

Notes

References

External links

1996 elections in South Korea
Inter-Parliamentary Union {{South Korean elections Legislative elections in South Korea

Parliamentary election A general election is a political voting election where generally all or most members of a given political body are chosen. These are usually held for a nation, state, or territory's primary legislative body, and are different from by-elections ( ...