This image, captured from footage of North Korea’s state-run Korean Central Television on Nov. 27, 2023, shows the North’s leader Kim Jong-un casting ballots the previous day at a polling station in South Hamgyong Province in the elections to pick new deputies to local assemblies. (Image courtesy of Yonhap)
SEOUL, Nov. 28 (Korea Bizwire) — North Korea said Tuesday there were votes against candidates for deputies to local assemblies in the latest local elections, marking the first time that the repressive regime has reported opposing votes in its elections.
A total of 27,858 workers, peasants, intellectuals and officials were elected new deputies for local assemblies of provinces, cities and counties in the local elections Sunday, according to the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). The voter turnout was recorded at 99.63 percent.
Among voters who cast ballots, 99.91 percent voted for the candidates for deputies to provincial people’s assemblies and 0.09 percent voted against them, the KCNA said. In terms of deputies to city and county people’s assemblies, 99.87 percent voted for selected candidates and 0.13 percent voted against them.
North Korea’s state media has not carried any report of opposing votes in elections so far, as elections are widely viewed as a formality. Candidates of elections in the North are hand-picked by the North’s ruling Workers’ Party and rubber-stamped into office.
In the elections to pick deputies to local assemblies in July 2019, the voter turnout was 99.98 percent and 100 percent voted for the candidates. In March of that year, North Korea reported 99.99 percent voter turnout and 100 percent approval in the elections to select deputies to the Supreme People’s Assembly, the country’s parliament.
North Korea’s rare revelation of opposing votes in the latest local elections may be intended to show that it democratically held the election following the revision of the election law.
For Sunday’s voting, Pyongyang allowed two candidates to be recommended in some constituencies and held a preliminary election to decide on a final single candidate.
But South Korea’s unification ministry said the North’s revision of the election law does not appear to genuinely guarantee people’s suffrage.
At polling stations, North Korea set up two separate ballot boxes of different colors — one for approval and the other for disapproval — a move that hampers the principle of secret voting as it is easy to see whether people vote for or against, the ministry said.
A fall in voter turnout in the recent elections compared with four years earlier could indicate North Korea’s control over its people may have weakened, as the number of citizens who are elusive from state supervision probably rose, according to a report by the Korea Institute for National Unification, a state-run think tank.
(Yonhap)
