In the Seoul mayoral election, a "election disaster" occurred in which voting was halted due to a shortage of ballots and ballot boxes could not be taken out until the day after the vote. As the election commission responsible for this incident failed to disclose the facts for more than 24 hours, public anger is growing. The core of the problem is turning out to be the election commission's "50% ballot printing guideline" and its "failure to distribute ballots by polling place."
◇ National Election Commission lowered the minimum ballot printing rate from 60→50%
The district/city/county election commissions set the standards for printing ballots. Under the National Election Commission are the city/provincial election commissions, and under them are the district/city/county election commissions. Taking Songpa District in Seoul as an example, the structure is National Election Commission–Seoul City Election Commission–Songpa District Election Commission.
An election commission official said, "District/city/county election commissions are divided into a secretariat and a commission. The secretariat submits a proposal on ballot printing standards to the commission, and the commission votes on it."
While the lowest-tier district/city/county election commissions decide how many ballots to print by region, the National Election Commission issues the guidelines. Until just before this local election, the National Election Commission instructed that ballots be printed up to 60% of the number of registered voters for local elections. However, it has been confirmed that after the 2022 local elections, citing a large volume of discarded ballots, it lowered the printing floor to 50%.
An official at the Seoul City Election Commission said, "Ahead of this election, the National Election Commission lowered the floor to 50% of registered voters, and within that, the district/city/county election commissions are to decide in consideration of local conditions and past turnout," adding, "It appears the Songpa District Election Commission decided on the 50% floor."
In fact, beyond Songpa District, the Incheon City Election Commission also printed only 50% of the number of registered voters and experienced ballot shortages at several polling places.
Here, "50%" excludes early voting. In early voting, once an ID is checked, the ballot is issued directly from a machine, so ballots are not printed in advance. An election commission official said, "Fifty percent of registered voters refers to Election Day voting," adding, "Songpa's early voting rate was 23%, and with 50% prepared for Election Day ballots, up to 73% of registered voters could have voted."
◇ Only in Songpa, 42,000 ballots remained
In this local election, the turnout in Songpa District was 65.82%. As the election commission explained, there should have been a gap of about 7–8 percentage points, and that many ballots should have been left over.
Let's do the specific math. In this election, Songpa District had 565,368 registered voters. Of these, 132,207 voted through early and at-home voting. The early voting rate was 23.38%. A total of 239,910 people voted on Election Day, for an Election Day turnout of 42.43%. Since 50% of registered voters was the standard, the number of Election Day ballots Songpa printed was 282,684. Subtracting the number who voted on Election Day leaves 42,774.
But the reality on the ground was different. Polling places across Songpa District descended into chaos due to ballot shortages. In Songpa alone, 12 polling places experienced delays or suspensions of voting because of a lack of ballots. Even a day later, about 2,000 ballots could not be taken out of their boxes and opened.
In the election commission and political circles, some point to the possibility of mistakes not in the total number of ballots but in the distribution process. An election commission official said, "Preparing ballots equivalent to 50% of registered voters refers to the entire Songpa District, and within that, the Songpa District Election Commission distributes ballots by polling place. In this process, some neighborhoods may receive many and others may be short, creating disparities."
A political insider familiar with election commission operations said, "If there were polling places short on ballots, the Songpa District Election Commission should have identified and addressed it in advance, but it appears no such response took place in Songpa the day before."
In fact, late at night on the 3rd, a resident met at Jamsil Raemian I'Park, where Polling Place No. 5 in Jamsil 4-dong was set up, a person surnamed Yoon (68), said, "Two polling places were set up in this apartment complex. I heard one ran short of ballots, while the other had some left," adding, "I was told that the place short on ballots asked for the extra ballots but was refused."
◇ In Songpa, turnout topped 80% in last year's presidential election… shortage of ballots was foreseeable
Some also argue that even based on Election Day voting, printing only 50% of registered voters' worth of ballots was a problem. In Songpa's case, turnout surpassed 80% in last year's presidential election. It is one of the areas where enthusiasm for voting runs high, exceeding the overall Seoul average of 77.9%. In this election, final turnout reached 65.82%.
Another election commission official said, "Fifty percent is merely the floor set by the National Election Commission, and more could have been printed. It is hard to understand why the Songpa District Election Commission, where turnout is high, decided on 50%." Some other district election commissions in Seoul reportedly printed ballots based on 60% and had no particular issues. Mapo and Gangbuk are representative cases.
This incident also conflicts with the National Election Commission's previous explanation that it printed ballots at around 70% of registered voters. In a 2020 post titled "Election Day ballot preparation, dispatch, and storage process," the National Election Commission said, "We generally decide the print run at 70% of registered voters."
A political insider said, "Until the 2010s, the standard was to decide the print run at 80% of registered voters, but as ballot printing kept being reduced, this mess happened," adding, "It seems the election commission prioritized expense reduction over fair election management, putting the cart before the horse."