Daisy accuses agency of vote fraud

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Daisy accuses agency of vote fraud

Singer Yoo Jung-ahn, known by her stage name Daisy, a former member of girl group Momoland, accused the group’s agency MLD Entertainment of rigging the votes during the Mnet audition program “Finding Momoland” which led to the creation of the group in 2016.

“The day that I didn’t make the final team, the agency called me and told me that regardless of the audition results, I will make the final team,” Daisy told KBS in an exclusive interview aired on Tuesday.

“They said that all that arrangements had been made.”

Daisy, 21, joined the girl group in March 2017, half a year after the group was formed with finalists of the show.

“Finding Momoland” aired on Mnet in the summer of 2016. The finalists were decided based on judges’ and audience’s scores of the contestants’ performances. Mnet denied involvement in running the program, but KBS found evidence to prove otherwise.

MLD Entertainment issued a statement Wednesday refuting Daisy’s claims.

“There was no vote-rigging,” the agency said in its statement. “We saw Daisy’s potential and asked her to remain as a trainee at the agency at the end of the show. We then asked her in November 2016 if she would be interested in joining the group. She did so in March 2017.”

Daisy left the group in November last year. She told KBS in the recent interview that the agency demanded 1.1 billion won ($940,432) for discontinuing her contract earlier than the agreed term.

To this, the agency said that Daisy’s mother asked the agency to discontinue Daisy’s contract in March 2018, to which the agency said it agreed to without charging her anything, but the agency changed its mind when her mother requested “unreasonable sums of money.”

Mnet was recently found to have rigged the votes for the K-pop audition program “Produce 101.” A number of its producers have been indicted and are currently undergoing trial.

By Esther Chung
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