In brief
On Wednesday, a special counsel team raided the National Election Commission (NEC) headquarters in Gwacheon, South Korea, following allegations that the agency favored a ballot printer supplier. Investigators seized evidence suggesting NEC officials provided advance bid information and required local commissions to purchase machine parts and ink from the chosen company, amounting to contracts worth 32.1 billion won for ballot machines and 13.8 billion won for ink. Earlier this week, the same team searched NEC premises again over suspicions of illegal monthly allowances to commissioners.
Special counsel investigators raided the National Election Commission (NEC) headquarters in Gwacheon, south of Seoul, on Wednesday, after allegations that the agency had given preferential treatment to a ballot printer supplier in a large procurement deal.
The raid was led by special counsel Lee Tae-han and involved 32 personnel, including two prosecutors, who searched a division of the NEC and the office and factory of the unnamed supplier.
Lee’s team said it found evidence that NEC officials provided advance bid information for a contract to build early‑voting ballot‑issuing machines, and that the agency had revised internal guidelines to require all local election commissions to purchase ink and other supplies from the chosen company.
As a result, the supplier reportedly delivered about 17,000 ballot‑issuing machines to the commissions in a 32.1‑billion‑won ($24 million) project, the largest contracted by the NEC in the past five years. Between December 2023 and July 2026, the company also supplied 13.8‑billion‑won worth of ink and other supplies to the commissions, the team said.
Lee’s investigation comes after the NEC was launched in early September to probe the unprecedented ballot shortages that plagued the nationwide local elections in June, and earlier this week the team searched the NEC again over suspicions that the watchdog illegally paid commissioners monthly allowances.
Sources for the raid’s details are from Yonhap, which carried the official announcement of the special counsel’s actions. No independent eyewitness statements have been verified beyond the investigative team’s findings.
