▲ National Election Commission
It has been learned that National Election Commission (NEC) officials under investigation for alleged "voting statistics manipulation" offered explanations regarding false data entry to the effect of, "Isn't it fine as long as the final voter turnout is correct?"
According to the legal community on Friday, the joint investigation headquarters of prosecutors and police (led by Kim Tae-hoon, deputy chief prosecutor of the 3rd Criminal Division at the Seoul Central District Prosecutors' Office) tasked with uncovering the truth behind violations of citizens' voting rights secured such statements the previous day from working-level officials at the NEC and the Gyeonggi Provincial Election Commission.
The joint investigation headquarters is investigating after uncovering that working-level NEC officials in charge of managing local polling stations during the June 3 local elections arbitrarily modified statistical figures in the election management system to cover up mistakes in wrongly entering the number of voters.
Instead of following procedures that require reporting to superiors and obtaining approval to modify figures when a data entry error occurs, working-level officials allegedly manipulated statistics by arbitrarily entering false numbers.
In response, the joint investigation headquarters conducted raids the previous day on the NEC in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi Province, as well as the Songpa-gu, Gangnam-gu, and Seocho-gu election commissions, securing related materials.
Working-level officials from the NEC and Gyeonggi Provincial Election Commission who carried out the statistical manipulation were also raided under charges including violation of official electronic records and obstruction of official duties.
During the raids the previous day, while admitting to the allegations of false entry, the NEC officials put forward arguments to the effect of, "Isn't the final voter turnout what matters?"
This is the argument that there is no problem because they ultimately matched the numbers by correcting the wrongly entered number of voters from earlier time slots through "additional statistical manipulation."
Investigators view this explanation as lacking persuasion, given that the NEC discloses voter turnout by time slot on election day, and voters also make decisions such as whether to vote based on this information.
Following yesterday, the joint investigation headquarters is continuing to conduct a search and seizure on the NEC servers today.
Regarding the ballot paper shortage incident, the head of the Dongjak-gu Election Commission's secretariat is also being summoned today for questioning as a suspect.
Reference questioning of three NEC officials is also scheduled regarding suspicions surrounding the junket trip of former National Election Commission Chairperson Roh Tae-ak.
(Photo: Yonhap News)
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