'Bu' or 'Mu'... Lee's '84-Minute Invalid Vote Commotion' Gone Now?

'Anonymous Voting Electronic Transition' Legal Amendment Promotion
First Electronic Voting in Constitutional History in 2010
Principle of Anonymous Voting Remains Intact

The invalid ballot incident that delayed the vote count for 84 minutes during the arrest motion vote against Lee Jae-myung, leader of the Democratic Party of Korea, last February is unlikely to happen again.

This is because the ruling and opposition parties have agreed to pass a bill in the April National Assembly session to switch all secret ballots conducted in the plenary session of the National Assembly to electronic voting devices in principle.

According to Article 112 of the current National Assembly Act, personnel-related agenda items are to be voted on by secret ballot. However, voting can be conducted using electronic devices based on an agreement between the ruling and opposition parties.

On the 4th, the ruling and opposition parties met at the National Assembly under the chairmanship of Speaker Kim Jin-pyo and announced a joint statement containing this agreement.

The push to amend the National Assembly Act is interpreted as an effort to prevent a recurrence of the so-called 'invalid ballot incident.' The vote on the arrest motion against Lee held in the plenary session on February 27 was conducted by handwritten secret ballot.

During the counting process, many ballots contained illegible handwritten characters that appeared as '우' (u), '무' (mu), or '부' (bu), leading to disputes between the ruling and opposition parties and causing confusion that delayed the counting by 84 minutes. Ultimately, the arrest motion was rejected with 139 votes in favor, 138 against, 11 invalid ballots, and 9 abstentions. The arrest motion requires a majority of the attending members' approval to pass.

On February 27, during the 8th plenary session of the 403rd National Assembly (extraordinary session) held at the National Assembly in Yeouido, Seoul, counting members debated the validity of invalid ballots during the vote counting process for the arrest consent motion against National Assembly member Lee Jae-myung. Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

Even after the rejection of the arrest motion, the dispute over the invalid ballots continued. Both the ruling and opposition parties claimed that the other side insisted on handwritten voting. On February 28, the day after the vote, Joo Ho-young, floor leader of the People Power Party, said, "If electronic voting is used, it would be slightly more advantageous for us who want approval. Electronic voting eliminates the possibility of invalid ballots," adding, "We proposed electronic voting to the Democratic Party, but I understand they did not agree."

However, the Democratic Party refuted Joo's claim as untrue. On the same day, Oh Young-hwan, the Democratic Party floor spokesperson, sent a text message to reporters stating, "Our party conveyed that 'handwritten voting takes a long time, and recent personnel agenda items have been voted on electronically, so it would be better to do so,' but the People Power Party insisted on 'following the principle,'” rebutting the claim.

As explained by Floor Leader Joo, electronic voting virtually eliminates the possibility of invalid ballots. Members enter a single-person voting booth and cast their vote by touching the 'Approve,' 'Reject,' or 'Abstain' buttons on a touchscreen with their finger. This method significantly reduces the time required to process agenda items compared to paper ballots.

In fact, in the two recent arrest motion votes conducted by electronic voting based on the ruling and opposition parties' agreement, no invalid ballots were recorded. On December 28 last year, the arrest motion against Democratic Party lawmaker Roh Woong-rae was rejected with 101 votes in favor, 161 against, and 9 abstentions out of 271 present. On the 30th of last month, the arrest motion vote against People Power Party lawmaker Ha Young-je was approved with 160 votes in favor, 99 against, and 22 abstentions out of 281 present, with no invalid ballots.

The first electronic vote in the history of the National Assembly plenary session was conducted in April 2010 for the vote on the recommendation of members to the Stock Blank Trust Review Committee.

The biggest concern at the time was whether the 'secret ballot principle' could be maintained during electronic voting. In the existing secret ballot system, members enter the voting booth and place their nameplate and ballot paper into the nameplate box and ballot box, respectively. Critics pointed out that switching to electronic voting could leave individual voting records for each member.

To dispel these concerns, electronic voting is conducted using card-type nameplates that do not contain personal identification information. Members who receive the card-type nameplates insert them into the voting device in the booth and then cast their vote via touchscreen.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.