Sunday, August 3, 2003
North Koreans go to polls for new parliament
Agence France-Presse Seoul, August 3
North Koreans voted on Sunday for a new parliament in an election overcast by dire economic conditions and a prolonged stand-off between the communist country and the United States.
The elections, the first since July 1998, are to choose delegates to the 11th Supreme People's Assembly (SPA), the communist country's 'rubber-stamp' legislature, as well as regional assemblies.
The North's legislature has nominal power to approve and settle the government budget and handle major state affairs. It convenes irregularly once or twice a year.
Real power resides with the Korean Workers' Party and the military elite, led by North Korean leader Kim Jong-II.
About 690 SPA and 29,000 local council seats are at stake. Their term of office is five years.
Candidates include Kim, who is standing unopposed for the SPA and whose election is a mere formality.
As general secretary of the ruling Workers' Party, Kim has led the powerful National Defence Commission, which controls North Korea's 1.2 million-strong military, since the death of his father, Kim Sung-II, in 1994.
North Korea's state media urged all voters to take part in Sunday's elections and show their loyalty to Kim.
Voter turnout was 85.68 per cent at 0300 GMT, the official Korean Central News Agency said.
At the previous SPA elections, Kim Jong-II, 61, pushed a group of seniors in their 80s into the background in a generational shift to consolidate his leadership.
North Korean experts say that Kim, still surrounded by many of the old guard loyal to his late father and now in their 70s, needs younger aides who will help introduce more reforms aimed at reviving North Korea's moribund economy.
From July last year Kim introduced limited economic reforms, freeing wages and prices previously controlled under the socialist command economy. State rationing of necessities has since been phased out, with people allowed to increase their wages if they lift profits.
Such measures, however, may have backfired on the Stalinist leadership as economic conditions deteriorated after the nuclear crisis flared in October when Washington accused Pyongyang of running a clandestine atomic program based on enriched uranium.
North Korea has relied heavily on outside donations to feed its 22 million population over the past seven years as a result of the failure of its centralised economy and natural disasters.
North's economy is now in a worse state than ever due to a shortage of energy and raw materials and dwindling donations from abroad. North Korea's chronic energy shortage deepened after Washington and its allies withdrew fuel aid in November.
© Hindustan Times Ltd. 2003. Reproduction in any form is prohibited without prior permission