North Korean leader Kim Jong-il called for "single-hearted unity" on Wednesday as his nation prepared to hold long overdue parliamentary elections, in which Kim will represent a military electorate, state media said.
North Korea bypassed the important election last autumn amid reports that Kim had a stroke in August. In January, Pyongyang set the vote for March 8 in a sign that Kim is now back in full charge.
"The forthcoming election will exalt the dignity and authority of our socialist country," Kim said in an open letter to his citizens. It demonstrates "the might of our single-hearted unity," he said.
In the letter, he encouraged people to vote, calling the election "significant" part of an ongoing economic drive. North Korea seeks to significantly strengthen its economy by 2012, the 100th birthday of the
late Kim Il-sung, Kim Jong-il's father and the founder of North Korea.
In line with the economic campaign, the North Korean leader has made notably more public inspections of manufacturing facilities when compared with recent years.
"The election to the 12th Supreme People's Assembly is all the more significant in that it is to be held in a pulsating period where a fresh revolutionary upsurge is being brought about on all fronts of the building
of a great, prosperous and powerful country," Kim said in the letter, according to the Korean Central News Agency.
The leader also said he has decided to run in the 333rd military constituency. Kim usually chooses to run in the first military constituency
to nominate him, although all constituencies do so in a symbolic move.
He represented the 666th and 649th military electorates in 1998 and 2003, respectively.
The North's parliamentary vote is a direct election, but only one candidate is appointed per district by the ruling Workers' Party and thus all are elected with 100 percent approval. The current 687 delegates were picked in 2003.
Some analysts say Pyongyang will use the parliamentary vote to pave the ground for Kim's successor. Kim turned 67 on Monday amid lingering concern about his health.
Intelligence sources told Yonhap last month that Kim had named his third and youngest son, Kim Jong-un, as his successor on Jan. 8.
The 25-year-old Jong-un, born to Kim's third wife Ko Yong-hi and educated in Switzerland, has been said to be his father's favorite, bearing a close resemblance in appearance and temperament to the aging leader.
Japanese daily Mainichi Shimbun also said on Tuesday that the third son has been selected.
The current leader took over when his father and North Korean founder Kim Il-sung died in 1994, the first hereditary power succession in a communist regime.