South Korea’s Early Voting Riddled with Accusations of Irregularities
Via a reader tip comes this news of irregularities once again with the early voting processes. If Yoon Suk-yeol loses a close election the ineptitude of the early voting will likely lead to mass protests. Hopefully this doesn’t happen, but clearly mass early voting and absentee ballots are once again damaging the creditability of an election:
Early voting for COVID-19 patients in the presidential election has ended with claims of election fraud, as voters alleged the National Election Commission (NEC) mishandled ballots at polling sites across the country.
Korea Times
Rival parties slammed the NEC’s “unpreparedness,” warning that polling station workers’ unprofessional handling of the early voting could trigger another vote-rigging controversy, following a previous conspiracy theory surrounding the 2020 National Assembly elections.
On Sunday, the NEC released a statement on the previous day’s early voting for COVID-19 patients across the country in which it apologized for “any inconvenience caused to voters.”
“The voting method for COVID-19 patients was fully in compliance with laws and rules, with the presence of election observers recommended by political parties,” the NEC said in the statement.
“However, we should admit that there were shortcomings in carrying out COVID-19 patients’ early voting due to the unprecedentedly high turnout and limits in personnel and facilities.” The apology came after media reports and social media postings about the NEC’s mishandling of COVID-19 patients’ votes across the country on Saturday.
You can read more at the link.
It was planned. It wasn’t an accident.
The fix is in boys….rigged election!
but clearly mass early voting and absentee ballots are once again damaging the creditability of an election:
@GIKorea
Early votings are part of the regular Korean voting process and are done for people who are unable to vote on election day because of prior appointments, business trips, etc.
Early voting are also done in overseas Korean missions for overseas Koreans who want to vote, and they follow similar procedures for elections here in Korea.(ID checks, ballots given, ballots put into ballot boxes by the voter, and later sealed and transported to the counting center by diplomatic pouches)
As for mail-in ballots, there are provisions for such, but for this elections it’s not being implemented and during the thirty or so years of voting, I’ve never seen it in action.
Put it simply, in Korea, standardized paper ballots and ballot boxes are the norm.
Early voting have been done for years without any issues. However this year it’s different because at the last minute it was decided to let people who have caught Covid-19 and are quarantined to leave their quarantine and vote.
From the looks of it, the NEC didn’t think things through, clear instructions weren’t given to the election workers and more emphasis have been put on seperating the infected voters and not have them touch the ballot boxes and the ID checking equipment and come into contact with the election workers without the suits, resulting in the mess the other day.
The Korean civil service aren’t exactly know for thinking things through, careful planning and being competent, so it’s not all that surprising.
So poor planning and incompetence yes, but consipracy, well I wouldn’t go that far.