Nonghyup elects new chairman
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Nonghyup Chairman-elect Kim Byung-won waves to his supporters during an event celebrating his win at Nonghyup headquarters in downtown Seoul, Tuesday. Kim was elected as the next chairman, replacing incumbent Choi Won-byung in March, after receiving 163 votes out of 289 in the runoff election. / Yonhap
By Lee Hyo-sik
Nonghyup said Tuesday that its representatives elected Kim Byung-won as new chairman.
Kim, 63, will manage the organization for the next four years. Nonghyup, with 2.35 million members, has assets valued at 400 trillion won ($333 billion), operates 31 subsidiaries and employs 8,800 people.
In a six-way competition, Kim emerged victorious from the election held at Nonghyup headquarters in downtown Seoul, Tuesday.
After failing to garner the majority vote in a preliminary round, Kim held a runoff election with Lee Sung-hee, former head of a Nonghyup chapter in Pangyo, Gyeonggi Province. Of the 289 delegates casting ballots in the runoff, Kim received 163 votes, beating Lee’s 126.
In 2007 when he first ran for the chairmanship, he faced off with current chairman Choi Won-byung in the runoff but lost. Four years later, he threw his hat in the ring again but failed to win the most votes.
Kim began his career at Nonghyup in 1978 after receiving a bachelor’s degree from Chonnam National University. From 1999 to 2014, he headed a Nonghyup chapter in Naju, South Jeolla Province, for three consecutive terms.
He will begin his term a day after Nonghyup holds a board meeting of its representatives in March to settle its 2015 accounts.