NEC Supporting Largest Online Vote in History During Elections for President of KFTA

NEC supporting private elections to resolve social conflicts and establish a clean election culture 

The National Election Commission (NEC) of the Republic of Korea is supporting the online voting system being used in the 26th election for the President of Korean Federation of Teachers’ Associations between June 10 and June 19. 

The NEC expects that through online voting, the election costs can be reduced for this election, which has an electorate of 145,987, the largest to use online voting in Korea. Also, the NEC expects that turnout will increase because voters will be able to conveniently vote at any time and place during the voting period using their PC or mobile phone. 

Since the online voting service was first used in November 2013, it has been actively used in elections such as those for representatives of apartment residents and for various federations and organizations, and in that time it has shown strengths such as convenient voter participation, reduced election costs and the resolution of distrust in election results. 

Recently, the use of online voting has extended as far as use in the field of taking opinions on policy decision making and conflict resolution, and in the 861 elections up until the second half of May 2016, it has shown an average turnout of 59.2%.

During the 20th National Assembly elections, for the first time for a party, the Justice Party use the online voting system to elect candidates for the proportional representation party list, and in 2015 an online voting system was introduced in Seoul Private Taxi Association elections to increase voter turnout, which previously had not reached about 50 percent, and the 2015 election recorded a voter turnout of 66.5 percent. 

In the future, the NEC will actively support online voting systems for organizations, federations or resident’s cooperatives and other groups in the case they apply for entrusted elections. In addition, in a case where the rules and regulations stipulating the leadership of the organization has unreasonable elements, the NEC plans to work hard and actively cooperate to solve social conflicts and spread a fair election culture. 

You can sign up to the online voting service website at www.kvoting.go.kr. 

Status of online voting systems

Online voting system support: Major Cases 

2016

Elections for the President of Korean Federation of Teachers’ Associations

• Date:  June 10 – 19, 2016 / Eligible voters: 145,987

• Largest online vote in history

• Expected to cut election costs compared to past elections and increase voter turnout by making participating in voting more convenient

• Agreement between the organizations on the ongoing use of a online voting system and facilitate mutual cooperation for democratic civic education 

Elections for the President of Korean Federation of Teachers’ Associations

• Date:  June 10 – 19, 2016 / Eligible voters: 21,993 / Voter Turnout: 65.9%

• Used the NEC’s online voting system to prevent controversies that occurred in past primary elections such as illegal proxy voting and vote switching

• Party members residing abroad participated (98 members)

• The Justice Party were grateful for the support, which they said was efficient and satisfied their needs

• In a survey of 942 voters, 77.2% said they were satisfied, and 95.2% said the system should be reused

2015

Seoul Private Taxi Association

Amendment Vote 

• Date:  June 21 – 23, 2015 / Eligible voters: 49,052 / Voter Turnout: 66.5%

• In 2011, in order to make amendments, a vote was held (for three days), but if they voter turnout did not reach 50% then the General Assembly itself would have been cancelled

• In this election the result using an online voting system was a turnout of 66.5% 

• Within the amendment, it was prescribed that future Chairperson elections would use online voting 

Chairperson Elections

• Date:  November 23 – 24, 2015 / Eligible voters: 49,100 / Voter Turnout: 74.8%

• There were objections to holding an online vote, including internal legal action and an injunction, but the high turnout quelled the controversy

• In cooperation with the association, election costs were cut and it was made easier for association  members to be engaged and to participate through their mobile phones, and therefore they were satisfied and these elections because a model for others

2014

Online Voting for Seoul Resident’s Cooperatives 

• In order to confront residents apathy and boycotts of elections due to issues such as the non-transparent operation of resident’s cooperatives  and corruption, and as part of the project to make cleaner apartments, a referendum was held on online voting system

• An amendment to the resident’s cooperatives management regulations was introduced to use online voting  for resident’s referendums or amendment votes (by February 2012)

• Ordinances providing the election costs for using online voting in resident’s cooperatives (by June 2015)

• Benchmarking online voting introduced in Chung-nam and Jeon-nam