'Olympic Park discovered as a new rally venue'
By Jung Seok-jun, The Herald Business
People Power Party lawmaker Park Su-min said Thursday that a parliamentary investigation into the June 3 local elections had uncovered a "lost five hours" during which the election management situation room was rendered inoperable, as well as a chaotic episode in which vote counting began while balloting was still under way.
Park made the remarks during an appearance on YTN Radio, saying the most pressing concern was "confirming whether the ballots, materials, voting records and vote-status sheets are being properly preserved."
Park, a member of the National Assembly's special parliamentary investigation committee on the National Election Commission, visited the counting center at the handball gymnasium inside Olympic Park in Songpa-gu, Seoul, on Wednesday. He also called on the Democratic Party of Korea to follow through on accepting a special prosecutor, saying it "must be launched soon."
Park added that Olympic Park had been "discovered as a new rally venue," saying it offered considerable advantages. "There is ample space for police standby, and it is spacious for demonstrators," he said. "I felt it was a decent outlet space."
He also cited structural problems at the National Election Commission, noting that its budget this year exceeds 800 billion won ($515 million) and that ballots had failed to be delivered for the local elections — the most important event of the year. "Systemic reform must be carried out by the National Assembly," he said, "but dereliction of duty by those in charge and on the ground will inevitably have to go to a criminal investigation."
Park said it was essential to determine "how the situation room went completely dark," adding that no simulation had been conducted and that the process had been handled "extremely sloppily" through the secretary-general's sole authorization. "We cannot avoid scrutinizing these processes," he said.
He said the decision to reduce ballot size — lowering the minimum threshold to 50 percent — had been made without any in-depth discussion on record. "Truly incomprehensible things keep emerging from the parliamentary investigation," Park said, adding that only 13 people had scrambled to respond to the situation in Songpa-gu.
mp1256@heraldcorp.com
