'Drugs are a pathetic, destructive choice': A father who reported his own son now runs beside him

"I always tell Ju-seong: if you ever feel the craving coming back, tell me. One failure is not a permanent failure. I will always be by your side."

Nam Gyeong-pil, the former governor of Gyeonggi Province and a five-term National Assembly member once considered a leading presidential contender, says his greatest fear these days is losing the thread of conversation with his eldest son, Ju-seong, who is recovering from drug addiction. "If drugs ever cross your mind, make sure you tell me" — a line Nam repeats to his son, one he could never have said easily during his years consumed by politics, when he left the young man alone far too often.

"Still, I don't think our conversations will ever break down," he said. "Going through the ordeal of drugs, my son came to understand the value of family more deeply than anyone."

Nam announced his retirement from politics in 2018 and went on to found NGU (Never Give Up), a drug prevention and recovery organization. Ahead of Drug Eradication Day on Friday, he sat down for an interview at the NGU office in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. "The most powerful protection against drugs," he said, "is the ordinary daily life of a family — parents and children sharing meals, talking, even bickering. That is the strongest immunity we have."

Nam's eldest son was arrested and indicted twice on drug-related charges. For using methamphetamine in 2017, he received a three-year prison sentence suspended for four years the following year. In September 2023, he was sentenced to two years and six months in prison on charges including marijuana use and methamphetamine injection. The person who reported him the second time was his father.

"When the crisis of my son's drug addiction hit, our family actually grew stronger," Nam said. "When I was in politics, I talked about changing the lives of millions. Now I believe there is nothing more precious than saving even a single life from drugs."

Nam shared the exchange during a detention center visit after his son was imprisoned.

He told his son: "You've become famous for the wrong reasons — but if you quit drugs and start doing good things for the world, that notoriety can turn into something positive. Then you can do anything."

Nam said what people with drug experience need most is not stigma but support and solidarity.

"Most families try to hide the fact of addiction," he said. "Don't try to bear that pain alone — share it with the people around you. When you share it, it becomes a little lighter."

Nam described drugs not as a simple crime but as "a disease that spreads like an epidemic." Most addiction, he said, does not begin with someone actively seeking out drugs — it starts with a suggestion from a friend, a sunbae, or someone trusted, driven by curiosity or sometimes outright deception.

"A first drug use is a crime, but it is also the process by which a disease spreads," he said. "Just as the state and society mobilized to fight COVID-19, drugs also require an approach centered on prevention and treatment."

Throughout the interview, the point Nam returned to most insistently was that drugs are no longer someone else's problem.

"What frustrates me most is that so many people still think, 'This has nothing to do with me,'" he said. "Because they dismiss it as a problem for a few reckless kids or certain troubled families, there is widespread indifference to building treatment facilities and putting proper systems in place."

"People need to recognize that anyone — me, my child, anyone — can be exposed to this risk," he said. "Only when drugs are accepted as everyone's problem, not someone else's, will politics and policy actually move."

He also called for a shift in how society perceives drugs.

"The moment drugs are consumed as something cool, children are already in danger," he said. "We need a shared understanding that drugs are the most uncool, pathetic and destructive choice a person can make."

As his son slowly finds his way out of addiction, Nam's dream is to establish a dedicated drug treatment hospital within a national university hospital system.

"Punishing people when there are nowhere near enough specialized hospitals and doctors is like trying to hold back a flood with your bare hands after the levee has already broken," he said. "The ultimate goal is to create a specialized drug treatment hospital inside a national university hospital, train doctors there, build a model for drug treatment, and then expand it nationwide."

"If there are politicians willing to work on building institutional mechanisms to reduce the drug problem, I would help with their election campaigns regardless of party," he said. "That is how urgently we need a system that supports not just punishment but treatment and recovery."

Near the end of the interview, Nam had a message for parents. He described academic credentialism and lookism as monsters that Korean society has created for itself.

"The false belief that getting into a good university means success, or that good looks will make life work out, is making children sick," he said. "We have become a society that even tolerates the misuse of ADHD medication and diet drugs."

"I, too, sent my son to study in the United States and China to get him into a good university," he said. "Parents themselves need to change — to stop putting academic credentials, grades and appearance ahead of their children's happiness."

On Saturday, Nam will host a marathon event alongside people in recovery who have decided to break up with drugs. His focus on running grew directly from watching his son change. After his release from prison, Ju-seong spent a long stretch shut inside his room — until one day he stepped back out into the world.

"He came out of that cave and the first thing he did was start eating again, and then he started running," Nam said. "Running isn't just exercise — it was the best medicine for restoring his body, mind and spirit. I hope more people in recovery can rediscover the real joy that life offers, instead of the false satisfaction that drugs provide."