Errors were discovered with the ballot sorting machines used in Buyeo, South Chungcheong, during the April 2020 general election, police have revealed.
According to the Buyeo Police Department on June 15, two officials from the Buyeo-gun election commission testified to the police that a “[civilian] official tore off a counting status table that was misprinted and printed a new one to change the error.” The two officials were charged with tearing ballot papers during the 2020 general election, which is in violation of the Public Official Election Act and the Criminal Act’s invalidity of public documents clause. According to the JoongAng Ilbo newspaper, the two officials said that there were also errors made in counting ballot papers at Oksan-myeon district.
The incident occurred during the counting process held at Buyeo Youth Hostel on the election day. While they were sorting 415 early voting ballot papers using ballot sorting machines, some votes for candidate number 2 from the main opposition party were sorted as votes for candidate number 1 from the ruling party. A counting observer from candidate number 2’s camp raised a question about this at that time.
When the counting observer raised the issue, the counting station had a printed counting status table. One of the Buyeo-gun election commission officials ordered someone to tear off the table document.
After this situation was reported, people filed lawsuits against three election commission officials from Buyeo-gun. At that time, the commission explained that “it is never possible for votes for candidate number 2 to be mixed with votes for candidate number 1 when using ballot sorting machines.” It also said that ballot sorting machines sort ballot papers with vague marking as votes in need of review. The official from the commission told reporters last year that humidity might have caused ballot sorting machine errors.
The police, however, transferred the case to the prosecution, which had the option of not pursuing the case.
“Counting status tables become effective when the commissioner announces them as official after the reviewing process conducted by counting officials and election commission officers,” said police. “The invalidity of the public documents clause does not apply just because they tore off the counting status table, which was simply misprinted.”
According to the JoongAng Ilbo, the police added that “when they re-ran ballot sorting machines, the figures changed when compared to the first time and there was CCTV footage that showed someone tearing off something that looks like a document.”
Rep. Park Dae-chul from the main opposition People Power Party introduced the “Bill to partially amend the Public Official Election Act” on March 17, 2021. He explained that its purpose is to introduce content to the law so that manual counting should be the main method of counting in principle. It also aims to strengthen the management of voting and counting in public elections, including ways to improve measures and procedures taken during early voting. He has been arguing that “other developed countries like Japan use manual counting.”
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court will conduct a recount in Incheon Yeonsu-gu 2nd district on June 28. Former lawmaker Min Kyung-wook, who ran in the district and lost, filed election invalidation lawsuits with the court. He lost by 2,893 votes. Min has long argued that “ghost votes were mixed with actual votes” and “hackers from the Chinese Communist Party were involved.”
According to media reports, the Supreme Court will verify the QR codes printed on the early voting ballot papers instead of manually counting all votes. Reportedly, it is the first time that the court will verify election results by checking QR codes.
The QR codes used in the election contained a 31-digit number. The number contained various information, including the name of the election district and the election commission in the jurisdiction. Some people who believe that election fraud occurred argued that the QR code contained the personal information of voters and that it could be used to identify each voter, thus making them more vulnerable to manipulation. The use of QR codes in the voting process is highly controversial among election experts worldwide.
The Supreme Court is planning on randomly selecting 100 ballot papers each for all 4 candidates who ran in the Yeonsu-gu 2nd district election. They will compare the QR codes on the ballot papers and the QR code information stored in the National Election Commission. If the two pieces of information match, the court will likely decide that there were no fraudulent votes. It was reported that the Supreme Court ordered Min to pay 181.2 million won ($162,000) for experts to analyze the possibility of QR code manipulation.
Min has been arguing that all 40,000 votes should be verified. He also criticized the Supreme Court for delaying the trials and verdicts for more than a year beyond the 180-day deadline for handling election lawsuits.
