Exclusive: Ballot Shortage Chaos Unfolds, Yet First Emergency Meeting Held Only at Dawn

[Anchor]

On the day of the June 3 local elections, when a shortage of ballots occurred in Songpa-gu, Seoul, what were the members of the Seoul Metropolitan Election Commission doing when they should have been addressing the crisis? Our investigation has confirmed that instead of holding an emergency meeting, they proceeded with their scheduled field inspections of polling and counting stations. The Seoul election commissioners did not gather for their first meeting until 4:00 a.m. the following day.

This is an exclusive report by Kim Kwan-jin.

[Reporter]

Out of the eight members of the Seoul Metropolitan Election Commission, only five, including then-Chairman Oh Min-seok, were on duty on June 3, the day of the local elections.

What were they doing after 4:12 p.m., when voting was suspended for over 20 minutes at a polling station in Songpa-gu, Seoul, due to a shortage of ballots?

SBS investigation confirmed that three members, including former Chairman Oh Min-seok, visited a polling station in Sangdo 4-dong, Dongjak-gu, Seoul, from 3:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. to observe the voting process.

They were carrying out their routine, pre-scheduled field inspections as planned.

Despite the unprecedented situation of "voting suspension," they proceeded with their scheduled inspection of the counting station at the SETEC exhibition center in Gangnam-gu, Seoul, from 9:00 p.m. to 10:30 p.m.

It has been confirmed that no plenary meeting was convened to receive reports on the ballot shortage or to make decisions, such as how long voting hours should be extended.

The five Seoul election commissioners, including former Chairman Oh, did not gather for their first meeting to discuss the situation until 4:00 a.m. the next day.

This was a full 12 hours after the voting suspension crisis had begun, and it was found that even then, the meeting was held to discuss a statement to be released to the media.

Then, who made the decision to extend the voting hours at some polling stations, in some cases as late as 10:00 p.m.?

The Seoul Metropolitan Election Commission told SBS, "The commission decided to extend voting hours after discussions among working-level staff," adding that "the final decision-maker was then-Chairman Oh Min-seok."

However, they did not provide any records or documents to verify the exact approval process.

SBS attempted to contact former Chairman Oh Min-seok for questions regarding the response to the situation, but he could not be reached.

(Video reporting: Park Hyun-chul | Video editing: Yoon Tae-ho)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.