Democratic Party of Korea Aimed for 31.3% Early Voting Rate, And Got It

2024-4-9, Tara O

On April 7, 2024, the National Election Commission of South Korea announced that the early voting rate in the April 2024 general election was 31.28%, the highest ever in a South Korean election.  The early voting was conducted over two days—April 5 and 6, 2024, which was 4-5 days prior to the general election April 10, 2024.

Kim Min-seok, Democratic Party of Korea, Source: The JoongAng 

What is gaining even more public attention than the turnout rate is how it accurately reflected the Democratic Party of Korea’s (DPK; 더불어민주당) targeted turn out for early voting.   On April 3, 2024, Kim Min-seok (김민석) of the General Election Situation Office of the Democratic Party of Korea, briefed that the “DPK will target a 31.3 % early voting turnout and a 71.3% total voter turnout, and appeal for voter participation.”

Hwang Kyo-ahn, the former acting president and Prime Minister, stated that the early voting rate turned out to be the same as DPK’s specific target for early voting, which the DPK announced 3 days prior on April 4.

Predicting voter turn out in an election, let alone early voter turn out in an election, is not a precise science.  Polls fail to predict voter turn-out due partially to “social desirability bias,” where people tell the pollster that they intend to vote in order to look like good citizens.

Min Kyung-wook (민경욱), co-leader of the Fair Election Korea Party (가가호호공명선거대한당), asked, “How could the DPK have so accurately matched the turnout of early voting three days prior?” and added, “Of course, I know that the People Power Party (PPP) helped…,” meaning that PPP also encouraged early voting as did the DPK, despite the public concerns about opportunities for election fraud during early voting.

In fact, over the early voting period, election observers from various precincts noted that the National Election Commission’s ballot counts were much higher than the election observers’ voter counts.  If the election observers are correct, then the early voting rate would be less than 31.3%.