Ohm Ki-young, ruling Grand National Party’s candidate for Gangwon Governor at the by-election, was cornered by a group of the area’s residents for taking advantage of their “pure-hearted” work in his illegal election campaign.

Ohm is accused by his competitor, Choi Moon-soon of the main opposition Democratic Party, of having established an unregistered call center in a suburban area to induce voters to vote for him. Local police last Friday raided the “secret” center and apprehended dozens of people making covert campaign calls. Though Ohm downgraded the incident as the misdemeanor of enthusiastic fans, Choi claimed it to be a violation of Election Law that could later strip Ohm of his seat even if he wins the vote.

Ji Jin-ho, head of the group of civilians bidding to host the winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, Gangwon, on Wednesday expressed sense of betrayal toward Ohm, as the center was reported to have used a list of voters created by his group for another purpose.

“We had a grand meeting in February, where we disclosed the signature of about 1 million people who wanted to host the sports event at Pyeongchang. Ohm showed up at our event and asked me to hand him the list saying that he would like to have a look at it. I gave him the information of 200,000 (people),” he was quoted saying by Yonhap news agency.

“But he did not tell us that the list would be used to make phone calls for his own campaign. The police last week found our list at the problematic call center. Ohm has taken advantage of our zeal for the Olympics,”

Ji said his group has sent a warning to Ohm’s camp and that he has no relations with Ohm in any political way.

The DP on Wednesday said that Ohm has spent over 100 million won ($90,090) to fund the call center since March, even before the official election campaign kicked off. “Ohm should resign before he’s dragged,” it stated.


By Bae Ji-sook (baejisook@heraldcorp.com)