ED Independent counsel probe into NEC is long overdue
Special prosecutor Lee Tae-han answers questions from reporters at a law firm in southern Seoul, Tuesday. Yonhap
Investigation essential to establish integrity of elections
President Lee Jae Myung appointed prosecutor-turned-lawyer Lee Tae-han as independent counsel to lead an investigation into the embattled National Election Commission (NEC). The special counsel and his investigative team will have up to 170 days to determine whether a range of allegations concerning the NEC and its handling of the June 3 local elections are grounded in fact. The investigation will focus on 12 issues, including ballot shortages and alleged manipulation of voter turnout figures.
The lead investigator vowed to conduct an impartial yet thorough investigation into all suspicions surrounding the NEC and its management of elections. Lee said his team would uncover the truth based solely on facts and evidence, emphasizing that political considerations and partisan interests will have no place in the investigation.
“Our mission is to protect people’s right to vote, and we will remain focused on fulfilling that mission without being influenced by external forces. If we find that anyone has violated the law, they will be held accountable,” he said at a press conference Tuesday.
The special counsel’s investigation into the NEC is a welcome development. It is also long overdue.
Numerous allegations have been raised in recent years about the NEC and its handling of elections. Yet the government, particularly the National Assembly, did little to investigate them. Politicians and much of the media dismissed the allegations without making meaningful efforts to verify them. In a healthy democracy, reasonable doubts should prompt efforts to establish the facts, not attempts to silence or stigmatize those who raise them.
In this sense, last month’s bipartisan agreement to appoint an independent counsel to investigate the NEC and its election management system was a welcome step forward.
Serious allegations emerged concerning the NEC’s handling of elections. These include ballot shortages, alleged manipulation of real-time voter turnout figures and ethical lapses involving NEC employees and senior officials.
Consider Rho Tae-ak, a retired Supreme Court justice and former NEC chairman. He and his wife took three luxury business trips between 2022 and 2025, with all expenses paid by the NEC. During a National Assembly hearing, Roh insisted that the trips were work-related. Asked how his and his wife’s 2024 trip to Estonia was connected to his duties, Rho said the NEC was considering introducing electronic voting in the future and that Estonia was viewed as a model.
His explanation raises another troubling issue: his apparent lack of understanding of the cybersecurity vulnerabilities associated with electronic voting. As a former NEC chairman, he should have been fully aware of the potential risks. Yet he still advocated for electronic voting publicly. Even more troubling, no one at the National Assembly hearing appeared prepared to challenge him on this fundamental issue.
Whether the NEC’s problematic election management was intended to benefit a particular party or candidate is a secondary question. The more immediate concern is that unresolved suspicions, when not addressed through a credible and independent investigation, inevitably erode public trust in the electoral system.
In a democracy, election integrity is fundamental. It can make or break democratic institutions. Yet in Korea, for reasons that remain difficult to understand, election integrity has too often been treated as an insignificant issue. When problems have emerged, the NEC has at times appeared more interested in minimizing or dismissing them than in fully explaining what went wrong. An incompetent or opaque election commission poses a serious threat to public confidence in elections.
Foreign interference presents another potential threat to election integrity.
In 2024, Romania canceled its presidential election shortly before the runoff after its top court cited evidence of Russian interference, cyberattacks and irregularities. In 2023, Canada appointed a special rapporteur to investigate allegations of Chinese interference in its 2019 and 2021 elections, and subsequent investigations confirmed attempts by China to interfere in Canadian democratic processes through political influence, disinformation and other means, although it was concluded the efforts did not affect the election results. The U.S. conducted an extensive investigation into Russian interference in its 2016 presidential election, which detected attempts to penetrate state election systems.
Is Korea immune to foreign interference? The National Intelligence Service (NIS) says no.
In November 2023, the NIS announced that a Chinese public relations company had operated 38 fake news websites designed to influence public opinion in Korea. The agency said the sites were disguised as news outlets and used social media to circulate anti-U.S. and pro-China content. The announcement came just six months before the 2024 National Assembly elections.
Although foreign interference was not included in this investigation, Korea should remain vigilant against it.
Compared with other advanced democracies, Korea’s response to threats to election integrity has been slow and inadequate. That must change.
A thorough investigation of the NEC and recent elections by a trusted, independent body can help establish the facts and, just as importantly, restore public confidence in the country’s election management system.
That is why the special counsel’s investigation matters. The integrity of elections is too important to be left to political convenience, institutional self-protection or partisan assumptions.