By Rigoberto Banta Jr., Student Editor

 

The election process for the 19^th president of Chonnam National University (CNU) concluded on May 23^rd with Dr. Park Chang-soo emerging as the top candidate. Out of the total 1,759 votes eligible, Park received 463.623 votes while the second contender, Professor Lee Byung-taek from the College of Engineering received 430.416 votes. The third candidate, Dr. Yoon Taek-lim from the College of Medicine, received 333.069 votes in total.

As the top candidate, CNU’s Presidential Recommendation Committee (PRC) will recommend him to be the 19^th university president of CNU to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (MEST) together with the second candidate with the highest garnered votes, Professor Lee Byung-taek.

Dr. Park, a professor from the College of Medicine, said that he would like to “introduce an administration that communicates rather than instructs” in a press conference held as a result of his selection as the 19^th university president immediately after the ballot counting on May 23^rd at the University Administration Building.

The steps taken in order to secure a fair and democratic presidential election has been placed as a first priority of the PRC. CNU has taken brazen steps against the will of MEST to appoint the new president of CNU with a whopping 97 percent agreement from all professors of CNU. With this, CNU, together with Pusan National University and Kyungbuk National University will recommend their own presidential candidates to the MEST and shall in turn have lower funding from the central government for the current academic year. More than ever, CNU has expressed its stance towards the democratic will of its constituents.

Student representatives were given voting rights as well, for the first time in the history of CNU. The General Student Council (GSC) formed its Election Expansion Committee (EEM) aimed at seeking voting power for CNU students in the 19^th presidential elections. This special provision has been the call of the GSC ever since the election period started on campus. While 120 student representatives from different departments are given the chance to vote, efficiency was questioned by the GSC. Park Gyu-min (Senior, Department of Agricultural Economics), vice president of the GSC, said in an interview with The CNU Weekly that “as the first time providing the opportunity for students to vote in a larger scale, more students will directly result in fairer elections. However, in limiting the voting power of the CNU studentry, the votes will mean nothing.” Park refers to the 1.1 percentile that students’ total votes will provide in the whole elections.

More focus is provided to the Yeosu campus of CNU as well. CNU expanded in 2006 to include the former Yeosu National University to become one of its satellite campuses together with the Hak-dong and Hwasun campuses. The candidates and the top candidate, Dr. Park, promised more communication and coordination with the Yeosu campus to provide better programs for CNU students.

While the number of ballots garnered showed that the competition was tight between the top candidate, Dr. Park and the second-top candidate, Professor Lee, specific strengths were shown in different aspects. Professors and staff of CNU favored the first candidate, Dr. Park while students favored Professor Lee with a huge discrepancy in comparison to his other competitors. Dr. Yoon, the last placed candidate, showed promising strength within the staff members of CNU.

In cooperation with the Buk-gu Election Tribunal Committee, CNU successfully executed the 19^th university presidential elections. The ballot counting concluded at 20:00 Korean Standard Time.