'Evidence of rigged election pouring out,' Jang says

Damaged and reprocessed ballot storage boxes found during verification

People Power Party leader Jang Dong-hyeok moves to protest a press conference by National Election Commission Special Prosecutor Lee Tae-han at the handball arena in Olympic Park, Songpa-gu, Seoul, on Wednesday, where a public verification of ballots from the June 3 local elections was held. [Yonhap]
People Power Party leader Jang Dong-hyeok moves to protest a press conference by National Election Commission Special Prosecutor Lee Tae-han at the handball arena in Olympic Park, Songpa-gu, Seoul, on Wednesday, where a public verification of ballots from the June 3 local elections was held. [Yonhap]

People Power Party leader Jang Dong-hyeok on Thursday criticized the removal of ballot boxes following a public verification of June 3 local election ballots by the National Election Commission's special prosecutor team, saying the commission and the special prosecutor had "disappeared with the ballot boxes as if fleeing in the dead of night, as if carrying out some operation with the police."

Jang made the remarks to reporters at around 6:50 a.m. Thursday at the handball arena in Olympic Park, Songpa-gu, Seoul, after ballot boxes from the Songpa area were removed and transported following the completion of the public verification. "Evidence that could have vindicated the precious votes of the people has disappeared," Jang said.

Jang and a number of other PPP lawmakers had stayed at the scene overnight to prevent the removal of the ballot boxes, after observing the roughly 12-hour public verification conducted by Special Prosecutor Lee Tae-han's team on Wednesday.

At the scene, there had been discussion of transporting the ballot boxes to a location in Paju, Gyeonggi Province, at around 10 a.m. Thursday, with the special prosecutor, the National Election Commission, PPP representatives and civic delegates all present. However, the commission began removing ballots it had deemed unproblematic from around 6:30 a.m.

"During Wednesday's verification process, a vast amount of evidence of election fraud poured out. More evidence remains inside the ballot boxes," Jang said. "We will gather strength with the people again and fight to expose the commission's wrongdoing."

Jang also raised questions on Facebook about the propriety of removing the ballots. "The special prosecutor says that ballots subject to investigation are limited to those already selected, and that it has no 'authority' over the remaining ballots — so it will hand them over to the election commission," Jang wrote. "The moment the ballot shortage occurred, the commission already forfeited that authority. The commission is a suspect in this case. There is no investigation that entrusts evidence to the hands of a suspect."

Jang also cited irregularities allegedly found in ballots and storage boxes during the verification. These included boxes with damaged, altered or reprocessed seals, and boxes in which ballots from other precincts were found.

Jang also said verifiers found cases where the actual number of ballots fell short of the official tally, as well as ballots of a different color, ballots with narrower margins on both sides, and ballots missing an election official's seal or bearing a seal of a different color.

"This is only what has been uncovered so far. That is why we must safeguard the 2.47 million ballots," Jang said.

PPP lawmaker Kim Tae-gyu also raised doubts on Facebook about vote counts observed during the verification, writing: "At the table I checked, the Democratic Party (Garak-bondong proportional representation) was +100 votes and the PPP was -1 vote?"


mp1256@heraldcorp.com