A prayer meeting with thousands of people was held on the 5th at Cheonggye Plaza in Jung-gu, Seoul. It has been 4 days since the March 1st Prayer Meeting was held in the same place, with an estimated 8,000 people gathered by the police. This time, it was held in the form of an election campaign that is not affected by the number of restrictions according to the quarantine guidelines.
According to the police on the 6th, the ’10 million people’s prayer meeting’ hosted by Jeon Kwang-hoon, the senior pastor of Sarang First Church, was held in the Gwanghwamun area in Seoul from 11 am on the 5th. The number of participants from all over the country reached 4,100 according to police estimates.
The organizers said it was an election campaign for candidates running for a by-election for the National Assembly member of the National Revolutionary Party, headed by Pastor Jeon, but the rally lasted only regarding an hour. From 12 noon, officials from Sarang First Church and others got on the vehicle and made comments such as “Please participate in the donation”.
As a result of the rally that day, crowds gathered in the 200-meter section from Cheonggye Plaza to Mugyo-dong Intersection, causing inconvenience to citizens. Participants also lowered their masks in various places in Cheonggye Plaza and talked or ate gimbap, etc.
Citizens complained of inconvenience and said they were concerned regarding the spread of the new coronavirus infection (COVID-19). A 30-year-old office worker in Gwangjin-gu, Seoul, said, “I don’t know if I should have held a rally by using tricks in a situation where quarantine was unstable.
The prayer meeting ended at around 4 pm, five and a half hours following the event, following being ordered to disperse by the police. The police dispatched regarding 2,000 people that day to manage prayer meetings and campaigns. At the beginning, they did not ask for dissolution because there was no ground to crack down on them, but it is reported that the dissolution procedure was carried out following the election committee concluded that “it can no longer be regarded as an election campaign” following the campaign was remarked.
By Song Jin-ho, staff reporter [email protected]
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