Sports officials, athletes, police frustrated as right-wing election protestors occupy Seoul handball stadium for sixth day

Protesters have taken over the Handball Gymnasium at the Olympic Park for the sixth day, demanding a do-over of the local elections due to a shortage of ballots at several voting stations. While they demand the protection of citizens' right to vote, athletes wander helplessly and are unable to enter the premises.

The protest grew out of the June 3 nationwide local elections. The demonstrators allege the vote was rigged, citing a ballot shortage at a polling station in Songpa District, and are demanding a fresh election. Ballot boxes from that station were counted days ago at the handball gymnasium in Olympic Park, but protesters have sealed the building's entrances and refused to let officials through.

By around 8 a.m. on Wednesday, every gate was still blocked. The crowd had thinned on a weekday morning, but people who had protested through the night sat in front of the gates and on the road.

"Please, we only want to bring out work items, like our laptops and a USB drive with our one-time passwords," said officials from the Korean Sport & Olympic Committee (KSOC) and other bodies, who tried to enter with the police.

Protesters who consider the laptops "evidence of fraud" blocked them.

"The laptops are key evidence, so absolutely not," the protesters said.

Some bystanders objected, saying that they "shouldn't interfere with people's livelihoods," but protesters held firm.

"If we let them in, there's no reason we've been guarding this place," they said.

Police proposed a compromise.

"Two staff and two citizens can go in as a group, and we'll allow filming," officers said, moving from gate to gate.

Some protesters began choosing representatives to go inside, but others objected and broke into the national anthem before the offer could be explained, and the attempt failed.

The officials who could not reach their desks struggled to hide their frustration. "It's payday for our staff and the deadline to file their mandatory insurance paperwork, but we can't do anything," said the deputy secretary general of the Korean Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance.

"We're supposed to pay our Asian Games national team athletes, coaches and referees today," said an accountant at the Korean Fencing Federation, surnamed Lee. "The athletes leave the country next week, so we have to pay for their accommodation, but we can't even settle the balance."

"We cannot comprehend why we are subject to insults and treated as bad people just for going into our own offices," a KSOC official said in a statement issued around 1:45 p.m. "We feel our workplace has been taken from us."

In particular, the protest is interfering with an upcoming sports instructor certification exam, as many materials are stored in the office inside the arena. 

"Most applicants spend at least a year preparing to take it, but we can't even retrieve the materials," the official said, calling on the government, the National Election Commission, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the KSOC to respond.

Officers on the ground have voiced their own frustration, saying they have little room to act even as public complaints grow. On June 8, players on the women's junior national handball team who tried to retrieve equipment for an upcoming competition were searched by protesters.

"From the signs and chants, it looks like this has become a far-right rally, and I watched them stop people on the street and test their political views for not joining the chants," said an office worker in Songpa District, surnamed Kim.

"I don't understand why the police stand by and let it happen."

Complaints have surfaced inside the police, too. Protesters have aimed personal attacks at officers, calling them "foreign police" or "fake police." At the site, demonstrators frequently pressed passing officers with questions like "Why are you wearing a mask?" or "Why won't you show your government ID?"

Posts venting about working conditions have piled up on the police intranet and on Blind, an anonymous workplace app.

"Riot officers are told to endure and not react, but it is hard to keep our composure in the face of deliberate jeering, provocation and abuse," the police officer who heads the security division of the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency's 2nd Mobile Unit, said in a post on the police intranet on Tuesday titled "Where has police authority gone?"

"This is an unauthorized assembly, but because it has not spilled into unrest or violence, the authorities are not stepping in, so most of the small-scale lawbreaking goes uncorrected," the officer wrote.

"Protesters are even inspecting officers' uniforms and blocking us from entering, seriously disregarding state authority," wrote another officer who said they had been assigned to the Olympic Park protest.

"Officers are mocked and even cursed at, working as if driven into a corner," the officer added. "We just do what we're ordered to from above, so I don't understand why the officers in the field have to take the abuse," another user wrote.

Separately, a presiding judge at the Seoul Eastern District Court, and court officials began an on-site inspection at around 3:05 p.m. that day at the senior community center in the Woosung Apartment complex, where the second polling station of Jamsil 7-dong had been set up.

The judge had partially granted a petition to preserve evidence filed by Kim Jeong-cheol, a Reform Party supreme council member who ran for Seoul mayor, approving four items, including the boxes used to store ballots and closed-circuit television footage of the polling station.

However, the inspection ended after about 30 minutes because the election materials had already been cleared away.

"We went in to check the boxes holding the ballots, but everything had already been removed," the Reform Party supreme council member said. 

"The election commission doesn't even know where the evidence is, which is a serious problem." He said he would seek to preserve more material.

"Since we failed to secure the evidence, we need to file an additional petition covering the ballot boxes at the counting station," the Reform Party supreme council member said. "We plan to discuss that part with the judge and file the additional request."

BY KIM CHANG-YONG, KWAK JOO-YOUNG [cho.yongjun1@joongang.co.kr]