[Editor's Pick] "Doing This Alone?" The Deadly Workload Bomb... Public Servants' Anger Over Lack of Solutions

These are posts uploaded by National Election Commission (NEC) employees to their internal bulletin board.

Regarding the ballot paper shortage, one employee argued on June 5, "While we admit the NEC made mistakes, we must make the current situation of an overloaded election system known," adding, "The root cause is a murderous workload and a lack of personnel."

On June 10, another employee asked, "One person manages over 100 polling stations; how could they possibly handle it alone when reports of ballot shortages come in simultaneously?"

In the case of the Songpa-gu Election Commission in Seoul, where the ballot shortage occurred on election day, the NEC explained that there were 13 employees, but only three or four were responsible for managing the voting situation at 146 polling stations under their jurisdiction. Since they also had to prepare for the vote counting, they were ill-equipped to respond to emergency situations.

The staffing situation at local-level election commissions in other cities, counties, and districts was not much different.

This is why employees are flooding the internal bulletin board with claims that a fundamental reorganization of the work system is urgent, stating, "The volume of work and logistics handled by local election commissions during simultaneous elections is immense."

Experts point out that more authority should be delegated to local government officials who are actually mobilized for election duties, and that training should be strengthened.

[Interview: Lee Jae-mook / Professor of Political Science and Diplomacy, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies: We could simply prepare emergency personnel who can be ready. We need to ensure they have the expertise for delegated election duties.]

While the ruling and opposition parties have reached a preliminary consensus on forming a special parliamentary committee to investigate the ballot shortage, there is growing pressure to hasten legislative discussions for fundamental reforms of the NEC system, including expanding the number of standing committee members.

Internal Bulletin Board Reveals: "One Person Managing Over 100 Locations, Impossible to Keep Up" (June 15, 2026, Morning Wide)

Reported by Park Jae-yeon | Video by Lee Seung-hwan and Yang Hyun-chul | Video Editing by Kim Yoon-sung | Graphics by Jang Chae-woo | Produced by SBS Digital News
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.