A recent survey released Thursday showed 54 percent of voter-age people in South Korea believe the government should be replaced in the upcoming presidential election and 33 percent believe the government should be reinvented. 

According to the National Barometer Survey(NBS), conducted by Embrain Public, KStat Research, Korea Research and Hankook Research on one-thousand-one respondents from April 14-16, support for replacing the government was the highest since the second week of January.

In terms of support for potential presidential candidates, Lee Jae-myung of the Democratic Party received 39 percent, the People Power Party’s Hong Joon-pyo and Kim Moon-soo each garnered eight percent, candidate Han Dong-hoon six percent, Ahn Cheol-soo three percent, and Reform Party candidate Lee Jun-seok three percent.

In the case of a hypothetical three-way confrontation that assumes Lee Jae-myung, Kim Moon-soo and Lee Jun-seok will compete in the presidential election, Lee Jae-myung’s approval rating was 45 percent, Kim's 22 percent and Lee Jun-seok's nine percent, the survey found.

In a hypothetical three-way race between Lee Jae-myung, Hong Joon-pyo and Lee Jun-seok, the DP’s Lee Jae-myung was named as top pick by 24 percent of respondents, Hong 24 percent and Lee Jun-seok seven percent.

In the case of a three-way competition between Lee Jae-myung, Han Dong-hoon and Lee Jun-seok, 45 percent of respondents picked Lee Jae-myung, 17 percent chose Han and eight percent named Lee Jun-seok.

The NBS survey had a confidence level of 95 percent with a margin of error of plus or minus three-point-one percentage points.