The National Election Commission's headquarters in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi, as seen in a photo taken on July 29YONHAP
A special counsel probe has found that election officials in 30 cities, counties and districts entered manipulated hourly voter turnout figures during Korea’s latest local elections.
Investigators raided seven election offices on Thursday, including the National Election Commission (NEC), as they sought to determine the scale of the falsified entries and whether officials acted in a coordinated manner.
The investigation follows issues with the June 3 local election where some voters were unable to cast their ballot in time because some polling places ran out of paper ballots.
The team, led by special counsel Lee Tae-han, began executing search and seizure warrants at 9:10 a.m. at the NEC and four provincial-level election commissions in South Chungcheong, Gwangju-Jeonnam, South Gyeongsang and Gangwon.
The election commissions for Nam District in Busan and Seogwipo in Jeju were also searched.
A total of 31 officials were dispatched to the sites, including three prosecutors, 20 investigators and eight digital forensic investigators.
The special counsel team had stationed digital forensic investigators at the NEC for several weeks to analyze records such as logs of hourly voter counts from polling stations nationwide.
More than 70 election officials at the township, neighborhood, city, county and district levels who were responsible for reporting voter turnout in real time were also questioned.
A draft of a special counsel probe bill over the National Election Commission submitted by the ruling Democratic Party on July 9YONHAP
The investigation uncovered manipulated entries in 25 additional areas, including: Guro District, western Seoul; Mapo District, western Seoul; and Seongbuk District in central Seoul. Areas outside of Seoul such as Suwon and Seongnam in Gyeonggi and Cheongju in North Chungcheong also had fudged entries, according to the special counsel team.
Some election commissions initially entered voter counts for certain time slots that later turned out to be higher than the actual final turnout, according to the special counsel team. Officials then altered the overall figures afterward to make the figures match.
Investigators also found cases in which officials left the incorrect figures in place and entered the same numbers for later time slots or increased them by fixed amounts.
A previous joint investigation team had already identified similar cases in five areas: Seocho and Gangnam districts in southern Seoul; Gimpo and Uiwang in Gyeonggi; and Jincheon County in North Chungcheong.
That brought the total number of cities, counties and districts where manipulated entries were identified to 30.
Then-National Election Commission Chairperson Rho Tae-ak bows before delivering a public apology over the ballot paper shortage during the June 3 local elections at the commission's headquarters in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi, on June 5.NEWS1
The special counsel team believes those distorted figures were released to the public as real-time voter turnout information.
Investigators plan to use evidence seized in the raids to determine the extent of the manipulated entries, whether officials acted in a coordinated manner and who should be held responsible.
“Such manipulated entries undermine public trust in the fairness and transparency of elections and create distrust in the electoral system itself,” the special counsel team said. “We will focus our investigative resources on determining why this occurred and clearly establishing responsibility.”
Meanwhile, a protest demanding a revote of the local elections is still continuing in SK Olympic Handball Stadium in Songpa District in southern Seoul, a venue used as a ballot counting center for the latest local election.
This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.
