Board of Audit and Inspection Launches Budget Audit of National Election Commission

▲ The Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI)

The Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) announced on July 6 that it is launching an audit into the budget planning and execution of the National Election Commission (NEC), which has faced criticism for poor election management that led to the infringement of voting rights during the June 3 local elections.

The audit will begin today and run through July 24, initially targeting the central NEC as well as regional offices in Seoul, Gyeonggi, and Busan.

Following the completion of the first phase, the BAI plans to conduct a second phase of the audit, which will last for 14 days.

A 42-member audit team, led by the Director General of the Administrative and Safety Audit Bureau, has been assembled for the first phase.

The scope of the audit covers 12 items across two main areas: the status of election-related budget planning and execution since 2022, and issues of significant public concern, including the implementation of previous BAI audit recommendations.

The budget planning and execution category includes the budgeting and spending for ballot printing, ballot printing contracts, election-related allowances, the operation of fair election support teams, wage payments for temporary workers, the purchase and management of election supplies, building leases, expenses and allowances for overseas voting management, and the estimation and adjustment of election-related labor costs.

The BAI stated that it will carefully review whether to include issues related to ballot printing in the audit, as well as the scope and timing, while considering ongoing investigations by the joint prosecution-police investigation headquarters and parliamentary probes.

In the area of public concern and the implementation of audit recommendations, the BAI will examine private contracts (including unit price calculations, contract bundling, contract splitting, and allegations of preferential treatment), official overseas business trips and travel expense execution, the use of business promotion expenses and overtime meal allowances, the implementation of past audit results (such as job performance expenses, reserve funds for by-elections, and local election expense execution and settlement), and the management of claims for the return of election expenses from candidates whose elections were invalidated.

The BAI plans to decide whether to expand the scope of the audit and the number of personnel for the second phase based on the findings of the first phase.

The BAI has been preparing for this audit by establishing a plan to examine the NEC's accounting sector and has already been collecting relevant data with a team of approximately 30 people.

The BAI aims to expedite the process as much as possible, with a goal of releasing the results before October.

The BAI explained, "The need for reform and external auditing of the NEC has been raised due to critical media reports and other factors. By auditing the NEC, which has not undergone an accounting audit since the regular audit of the central NEC in 2022, the BAI intends to develop measures to resolve public concerns."

(Photo: Yonhap News)

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