Jang Dong-hyuk: 'Noh Tae-ak said halting vote counts is not the NEC's authority'

Jang Dong-hyuk, leader of South Korea's People Power Party, revealed on Wednesday that the chairman of the National Election Commission (NEC) declined a request to halt the ongoing vote count. Jang stated that NEC Chairman Noh Tae-ak responded that halting the count was not within the commission's purview and rested with the Seoul Metropolitan Election Commission.

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The National Election Commission does not have the authority to halt the vote count.

Jang met with Chairman Noh at the NEC headquarters in Gwacheon, Gyeonggi Province, after polls closed at 10 p.m. He had urged Noh to stop the count, arguing that the release of exit poll results at 6 p.m. would inevitably influence subsequent by-elections if the count continued. "If we do not stop the vote count now, it will clearly affect the next by-election," Jang conveyed to the NEC chairman.

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This is a matter for the Seoul Election Commission to decide.

Addressing reporters, Jang referenced international precedents where invalid votes were recognized, leading to new elections. He emphasized the difficulty in predicting the impact on various local and regional candidate races, asserting that "if the right to vote has been infringed, it is naturally a case for election invalidation." The party's call for a halt comes amid an issue with insufficient ballots in some areas of Seoul during the local elections.

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If we do not stop the vote count now, it will clearly affect the next by-election.