Koreans have been heading to the polls all day to cast ballots in local elections.
They are seen as a test of how the public feels about the Park Geun-hye's handling of April's deadly ferry sinking.
Roughly 3-thousand-9-hundred regional posts are up for grabs in the elections - they are held every four years... including 17 important mayoral and provincial governor jobs that often serve as springboards for future national leaders.
Our team is on the ground at different polling booths and rival party headquarters throughout the nation - we'll connect with them throughout this special newscast.
Polling stations around the nation opened at 6 a.m., Korea time... and they will remain open until 6 p.m., so only about two more hours left until the end of the voting hours.
As of 3 p.m. on this Election Day, , turnout for the entire nation
stood at 46-percent.
That figure includes the more than 11-percent of eligible voters who cast ballots in early voting late last week.
Most of the nation's major cities showed a voter turnout in the 40 percent range as of about an hour ago, including here in Seoul, where the figure was 46-point-1 percent.
Stronger voter turnouts were being seen in the administrative city of Sejong, the eastern province of Gangwon-do and the southwestern Jeollanam-do province.
