North Koreans 'Vote' In Local Elections... For Pre-Approved Candidates Selected By The Government
North Koreans Given No Choice In Regional 'Elections'
Paul Vale— The Huffington Post UK
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North Koreans "voted" in staggering numbers during local elections held over the weekend, the regional ballots witnessing a turnout of 99.97 percent. That’s just about everyone. Unfortunately, the voters weren’t able to choose a candidate; there was only one on the ballot that had already been pre-approved by the central government of Kim Jong Un.
But voters were allowed/advised/told to attend local polling stations and place their unmarked papers in a box, an act of political propaganda to validate the beleaguered regime.
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Korean Central News Agency picture taken on July 20, 2015 showing Kim Jong Un visiting a polling station during the elections of deputies to the provincial, city and county people's assemblies in Pyongyang
Voting in North Korea is mandatory for anyone over the age of 17 and, according to defectors, is used as a form of census by authorities to gauge how many citizens have fled the country. Defector Kim Kwang-jin told CNN that not “casting a ballot” in North Korea is seen as treason.
"It is regarded as political offence, so it is taken more seriously than economic crimes," he said. "It means that, politically, someone is against the regime."
Those elected to positions in provincial, city and county People's Assemblies have little power, and are placed to do the bidding of the central government within their respective regions.
North Korea's Craziest Threats
January 1951(01 of07)
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Six months after invading North Korean forces started the Korean War, North Korean leader and founder Kim Il Sung says in a speech that U.S. and South Korean forces were the actual invaders and had prompted his army to retaliate. Kim vows to annihilate the North's enemies.
Caption: In this 1951 photo, Kim Il Sung talks to a North Korean combatant at the battlefront. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP Images) (credit:ASSOCIATED PRESS)
1994(02 of07)
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A North Korean negotiator threatens to turn Seoul into "a sea of fire."
Caption: Female North Korean traffic police officers gather in front of bronze statues of the late leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang, North Korea on Saturday, Feb. 16, 2013. (AP Photo/David Guttenfelder) (credit:AP)
September 1996(03 of07)
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North Korea threatens "hundredfold and thousandfold retaliation" against South Korean troops who had captured or killed armed North Korean agents who had used a submarine to sneak into the South.
Caption: North Korean soldiers gather along a Pyongyang street during heavy snowfall on Sunday, Feb. 17, 2013. (AP Photo/David Guttenfelder) (credit:AP)
January 2002(04 of07)
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After President George W. Bush labels North Korea part of an "axis of evil" with Iraq and Iran, Pyongyang calls the remark "little short of a declaration of war." North Korea's foreign ministry warns it "will never tolerate the U.S. reckless attempt to stifle the (North) by force of arms but mercilessly wipe out the aggressors."
In this Jan. 29, 2002 file photo, President George W. Bush gives his State of the Union address on Capitol Hill in Washington. Vice President Dick Cheney is at rear.(AP Photo/Doug Mills) (credit:ASSOCIATED PRESS)
November 2011(05 of07)
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A day after South Korea conducts large-scale military drills near the island hit by the North in 2010, the North's Korean People's Army threatens to turn Seoul's presidential palace into a "sea of fire."
Caption: In this Feb. 16, 2013, image made from video, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, center, waves as he attends a statue unveiling ceremony at Mangyongdae Revolutionary School in Pyongyang. (AP Photo/KRT via AP Video) (credit:AP)
April 2012(06 of07)
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North Korea holds a massive rally denouncing conservative South Korean President Lee Myung-bak as a "rat." It says he should be struck with a "retaliatory bolt of lightning" because of his confrontational approach toward Pyongyang.
Caption: South Korea's President Lee Myung-bak attends the 15th ASEAN - South Korea Summit in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Monday, Nov. 19, 2012. (AP Photo/Heng Sinith) (credit:ASSOCIATED PRESS)
June 2012(07 of07)
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North Korea's military warns that troops have aimed artillery at seven South Korean media groups to express outrage over criticism in Seoul of ongoing children's festivals in Pyongyang. It threatens a "merciless sacred war."
Caption: South Korean army soldiers patrol along the barbed-wire fence near the border village of Panmunjom, which has separated the two Koreas since the Korean War, in Paju, north of Seoul, South Korea, Saturday, Feb. 16, 2013. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man) (credit:AP)