Just for eyerolls - election turnouts in North Korea

[strannik01]

heijo recently posted at a table of election results for North Korea's Supreme People's assembly, the country's rubberstamp legislature. He noted that, in North Korea, much as in Soviet Union, people can only vote for one candidate, and they can only cast "yes" or "no" votes. And, between 1948-1957, there were separate ballot boxes for "yes" and "no" ballots, so election officials could tell right away who voted for what.

Year
Turnout
"Yes" votes

1948
99.97%
98.49%

1957
99.99%
99.92%

1962
100,0%
100,0%

1967
100,0%
100,0%

1972
100,0%
100,0%

1977
100,0%
100,0%

1982
100,0%
100,0%

1986
100,0%
100,0%

1990
100,0%
100,0%

1998
99,85%
100,0%

2003
99,9%
100,0%

2009
99,98%
100,0%

2014
99,97%
100,0%

I can't really say anything that North Korea expert Andrei tttkkk Lankov didn't say better in his LJ

I don't understand who gets anything about of this theater of an election. I mean, even the table itself looks comical enough. And you can't really say that, you know, they are such big sticklers for laws and formalities: the provisions of [Workers Party of Korea, DPRK's ruling party] charter have been violated without any real problems. In spite of everything the charter clearly demands, the party convention hasn't met in 35 (!) years, and nothing happened. By the SPA [elections] are holy writ. Why?

It should be noted that North Korea is still, strictly technically, a multi-party state. Aside from Workers Party, two parties - the Korean Social Democratic Party and Chondoist Chongu Party - are allowed to operate. They are both strictly under Workers Party's control, and they don't even pretend to have even token disagreements with the ruling party. Many people, including Lankov, wondered that the hell is the point of maintaining this Potemkin Village of a multiparty state, but DPRK keeps it going... for some reason. Just like the elections.

Which only makes the whole thing all the more patently absurd.