Mid-campaign break makes Sim bolder progressive standard bearer

The presidential candidate of the minor progressive Justice Party, Sim Sang-jung, left, shakes hands with a pedestrian near Mangwon Station while on the campaign trail in Seoul on Tuesday. Yonhap

By Kang Hyun-kyung

Presidential candidate Sim Sang-jung took a five-day break in mid-January. For a presidential candidate on the campaign trail, taking a hiatus for five days without reaching out to voters seemed like something akin to a gamble ― if not a detrimental move. At that time, there were just over 50 days left before the March 9 presidential election.

The clock for the election was ticking and it seemed like every minute counted. Other candidates were intent on engaging with as many voters as possible, adding events and gatherings into their already busy schedules in order to appeal to people's hearts and minds.

What Sim did, however, was the opposite. She chose to take some alone time. Canceling her fully packed schedule from the early morning to late at night, while making the surprise announcement that all her campaign would be suspended from then on, Sim then temporarily vanished from the public eye.

During those five days, the minor Justice Party candidate said, she stayed at her home in Goyang City, Gyeonggi Province, not doing anything or meeting anyone, except one leader of her party, who paid her a visit while at home.

Sim said that she kept thinking about what had gone wrong with her candidacy and with the Justice Party, in terms of why they had failed to convince citizens ― in particular the have-nots and diverse minority groups that they focus on representing.

She said that she was so drained that she slept as if she were in a coma for the first day.

Although Sim had disappeared from the public eye, she was not free from gossipmongers.

Some speculated that her ratings ― which were stuck in the lower single-digits, with some polls finding her support rate to be even lower than that of eccentric candidate Huh Kyung-young, whose declaration of presidential candidacy was considered a joke, rather than a carefully thought out campaign ― might be what triggered her abrupt decision to suspend her campaign.

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The five-day break turned out to be much-needed for Sim as a standard bearer for progressives. Her inner strength has grown and her toughness has been harnessed in such a way as to be more purpose-driven.

After some careful self-reflection and pondering about her party's identity in modern-day Korean politics during this time, Sim said that she realized that she must finish the presidential race and keep fighting to make things happen, regardless of the election results.

Sim likened Korea's political situation right now to what Marxist philosopher, politician and journalist Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) once said of Italian society, using his famous quote:
"…the old is dying and the new cannot be born."

"Gramsci defined such a vacuum as a crisis. I think what we are facing in politics is something akin to what Gramsci observed of his society," she explained.

Sim compared her presidential campaign with a desperate, lonely and daunting fight to break down the entrenched system that has been in place in Korea for decades, to level the playing field to ensure fair competition for all players.

"The presidential race may be seen by many others as a competition among a few candidates, such as Lee Jae-myung, Ahn Cheol-soo and Sim Sang-jung. But this is just how it is seen, not what the race is really about," she said. "What's happening behind the scenes is that, as a minor party candidate, I am fighting against the establishment. Fair competition will be possible only after the old system is destroyed, which, as of now, seems to be so distant. So, it would be fair to say that I am struggling in a desperate fight on the periphery to make my entry into the center possible."

Her five-day break has only strengthened her and her party's uncompromising spirit as the sole candidate claiming to represent the country's many minorities.

She vowed to pursue the long-term vision of the Justice Party as a trustworthy, credible party that can outlast partisan politics, without being deceived by short-term gains.

"As of now, the election has only 40-plus days left, and we could theoretically engage in smear campaigns as the other candidates are doing. We could stoke anger and hatred and attempt to curry favor with irritated voters to gain more votes from them. Or we could pledge anything to get elected, or divide the nation with polarized pledges to steer some of the voters in our favor. Doing so might help us gain some more votes," she said.

"But I won't do that, because the Justice Party cherishes our values and our existence is based on these values, which we are fighting for. Adding more votes matter, but I choose to be more faithful to the principles we set and to follow them, rather than to be swayed by short-sighted campaign tactics."