Overwhelmingly supported by black voters, African-American presidential candidate Barack Obama won the South Carolina Democratic primary Saturday with a strong lead, and restored his momentum before the full-scale race expected on "Super Tuesday" on February 5.

After all ballots were counted, Obama won 55 percent of the votes, more than double New York Senator Hillary Clinton's 27 percent, followed by former North Carolina Senator John Edwards with 18 percent.

The Illinois senator's lead in the exit polls was so strong that the US media all projected his victory in the primary even before any results were reported from the precincts.

After Obama consecutively lost New Hampshire and Nevada to Clinton, the first race for Democrats in the South became a "must win" for him. Only by way of his prevalence among blacks, who account for nearly half of the Democratic voters in the state, could he, at least, retain a tie with Clinton and go further toward the White House.

Obama's appeal to fellow African Americans was not in vain. According to the exit polls released by CNN, he won more than 80 percent of the black vote in South Carolina, in stark contrast to Clinton's 17 percent.

Out of the total votes given to Obama, 78 percent were from black voters and about 20 percent were from whites, the polls showed.

However, the candidate, who has been wielding the banner of the nation's unity, stopped short of playing the race card.

"The choice in this election is not about regions or religions or genders," Obama said at a victory rally. "It's not about rich versus poor, young versus old and it's not about black versus white. It's about the past versus the future."

In addition, Obama showed his popularity among young and educated voters, key factors in his win in Iowa.

According to the exit polls, he enjoyed the highest supporting rates of voters from 18 to 65 years old, and took a third of the votes from college graduates.

Economy first 

Echoing voters in the states that previously held primaries and caucuses, South Carolina Democrats view the economy as a priority, with 53 percent of whites and an equal percentage of blacks telling CNN exit polls that the issue came to their mind when they decided on candidates.

As public concern over a potential economic recession increases, with high oil prices, the subprime crisis and the budget deficit, both Democratic and Republican presidential contenders are expected to raise their voice on economic stimulus package initiatives and economic management experience.

Given the fact that Democratic voters, who are mostly on low incomes and suffer from the greatest unemployment risks, are in need of better healthcare policy, debates on the issue among the three candidates will become louder as the race continues.

Twenty-one percent of white and 28 percent of black voters in South Carolina ranked healthcare as their second priority, according to the polls.

The Iraq war, whose prominence in the race has faded somewhat, remains the third biggest issue among 20 percent of white voters and 15 percent of blacks. The debate over Iraq is less fierce than it is on the Republican side, partly due to the narrower distance on the issue between the Democratic candidates.

Three-way continues 

Temporarily basking in the South Carolina victory, Obama is expected to face serious challenges on "Super Tuesday," when a total of 22 states will elect their Democratic presidential nominee. Some delegate-rich states may well break the tie between Obama and Clinton.

Seen from South Carolina exit polls, despite an uncontested lead among black voters, Obama was the least popular among whites, winning support from only 27 percent of white male voters and 22 percent of white females, compared with Edwards' 44 percent of white men and Clinton's 42 percent of white women.

When asked which candidate was more experienced, 83 percent of voters chose Clinton and 9 percent preferred Edwards while only 7 percent supported Obama.

In a recent national poll by the Los Angeles Times and Bloomberg National Poll, Clinton led her rivals with 42 percent, Obama was second with 33 percent and Edwards lagged at 11 percent.

In the less than two weeks before "Super Tuesday," Clinton's predominance has been seen in populous states such as California, Arizona, New Jersey and New York, thanks to her popularity among white and Latino voters, among other factors.

Despite the lame performance in his hometown, Edwards insisted on his strategy of staying in the game "for the long haul." His big share of white male voters Saturday is considered to have diminished Obama's support among men and Clinton's among whites.

Political analysts said the former vice presidential candidate in 2004 is playing the "king-maker" role who accumulates delegates during the primaries and caucuses and chooses to ally himself with a front-runner, helping him or her win a majority in the nomination convention.

States or delegates? 

Unlike the Republican party that includes a "winner-takes-all" rule in some of its states' primaries, Democrats have the same rules for all states that delegates are allocated in proportion to a candidate's primary vote, and the one who secures a total of 2,025 delegates can be nominated as the party's presidential candidate at the convention.

Although Obama and Clinton have each won two states so far, the former led the latter by 63 to 48 in the numbers of delegates. Edwards, who has never triumphed in any state, has pocketed 26 delegates.

The February 5 race is in the spotlight as it will offer more than 1,600 convention delegates out of a total of 2,075 at stake.

Apart from delegates resulted from state-by-state primaries and caucuses, the Democratic nomination convention also includes 796 "superdelegates" -- officeholders and party officials who automatically have votes.

According to a recent survey of superdelegates by CNN, 182 votes, 79 percent of the total, go to Clinton, compared with 59 percent to Obama and 57 percent to Edwards.

(Xinhua News Agency January 28, 2008)