[Weekender] An ‘unwinnable’ race with a mission

As major candidates crisscross the country to drum up support in the final stretch to Tuesday’s presidential election, so too do a handful of fringe candidates -- to much less success.

Among them are Cho Won-jin and Kim Sun-dong, who represent two opposite extremes of South Korea’s political spectrum.

Cho of the far-right Saenuri Party is in the race with a clear mission: to save former President Park Geun-hye. The arrested conservative Park is standing a criminal trial for corruption after being ejected from office in March. 

Kim of the People’s Union Party aims for the political return of the now-defunct Unified Progressive Party, which the top court disbanded in 2014 for conspiring against the government.

Cho and Kim, like many in the crowded race now at 13 total candidates, are often not even presented in polls because of their scant support. The two are highly likely to lose the 300 million won ($264,000) they paid in deposits to the National Election Commission for the candidacy registration. The money is refundable partly when a candidate wins 10 percent of the vote and fully upon reaching 15 percent.

Still, the candidates appeared undeterred on their campaign trail.

“Hong Joon-pyo (the presidential candidate of the Liberty Korea Party) is a betrayer of President Park Geun-hye. He has done nothing to stop Park’s unlawful impeachment,” said Cho, canvassing in Busan on Wednesday.

At less than 1 percent in Wednesday’s poll by Realmeter, the staunch loyalist to the ousted conservative president called for her immediate release from jail.

“Help me stop those seeking to establish a leftist government” and “Let us review from square one the Choi Soon-sil scandal that led to President Park’s fall,” were his appeals to the voters during a televised speech hosted by the National Election Broadcasting Debate Commission last week.

Hong, who has made remarkable strides in polls in the past week, is seeking to unite all conservative voters behind him. He carries the flag of the Liberty Korea Party, the successor to President Park’s Saenuri Party following her impeachment.

Cho’s group -- backed by die-hard supporters of the ousted president -- then took the discarded name of the Saenuri Party for themselves.

“Park was unjustly impeached, and those responsible for the action are all North Korean sympathizers. We should make this fact known and restore Park’s honor,” the lawmaker has said.

Galaxies apart from Choi, Kim talks of how Western powers have aggravated military tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

The former lawmaker is mostly known for having setting off a tear gas canister inside the parliament to block the vote on the Korea-US free trade agreement in 2011. 

He said in a press conference last month, “For the sake of peace on the peninsula, we should dismantle the (currently lopsided) alliance with the United States. The threat of war we are facing is generated by Western powers.”

His main focus now seems to be the US’ Terminal High Altitude Area Defense anti-missile system, which South Korea is in the process of deploying on its soil.

“I will stop the ongoing THAAD deployment in Seongju, (North Gyeongsang Province),” Kim told residents of the rural town during a protest against the missile shield system. “It is a serious dereliction of duty for lawmakers who have failed to honor the public demand to stop it.”

Referring to US President Donald Trump’s recent remark that South Korea should pay $1 billion for the missile defense system, Kim said, “we cannot spare a penny (for THAAD) so take it back to where it came from.”

By Bak Se-hwan (sh@heraldcorp.com)