Tue, Mar 16, 2004 page8

• The KMT is in trouble, win or lose

  • By Chin Heng-wei 金恆煒
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  This year's presidential election can be described as the greatest battle in 50 years.

  The reason I'm saying 50 years and not 400 is that just

  over 50 years have passed since Chiang Kai-shek's (蔣介石) army was defeated and had to escape to Taiwan to establish a base from where to retake the mainland, until the 2000 presidential election, when the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) was defeated in a democratic election and had to relinquish its hold on power.

  In this year's election, the KMT is attempting a comeback using the slogan "A Second Transfer of Power."

  With the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) denouncing it as an attempt at bringing about "The Restoration of the Old Power" while making "A Deepening of Democracy" its own slogan, a blue-green struggle has taken a dramatic new shape.

  For the KMT, the transfer of power in 2000 seemed to mean the end of the party and the death of the nation, and this year's presidential election could be thought of as a last effort to support a collapsing structure.

  There is a strong sense of crisis within the pan-blue camp, which knows that if it is unable to unite, it only has Chiang's prediction to look forward to: "This retreat leaves us without a resting place."

  It was this sense that forced the present cooperation between KMT Chairman Lien Chan (連戰) and People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜).

  A Lien-Soong presidential pairing, which used to be considered a mission impossible, was finally achieved. Although the candidates and the KMT and PFP have their own separate designs on power, there is a common wish to recreate the party-state entity.

  This is also why the KMT and PFP, as soon as they joined up, dusted off former president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), and why Lien and Soong ironed out the "one China" concept, which some call the "one China consensus" and others the "one China roof" framework. They even jointly stressed the need for a "one China constitution," thus displaying the pan-blue camp's very deep sense of crisis concerning the party's continued legitimacy.

  Given that pan-blue integration is being carried out out of concern for the continued existence of party and nation, the division of power between Lien and Soong and the power conflicts between the KMT and the PFP have gradually been put aside while awaiting a return to power.

  Once that happens, they will begin dividing the territory.

  For the DPP, President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) victory in the 2000 presidential election meant that localization forces for the first time had a hold on government power.

  Of course, this happened thanks to the split in the KMT, or, rather, thanks to Soong's insistence on snaring the top post, and was also the reason why former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) chalked the win down to fate.

  What would the chances have been of the DPP winning power if Soong had been content with standing behind Lien in 2000, as he is today?

  The DPP would not have stood a chance, and it would have seriously reduced the possibility of a transfer of power this year or in 2008.

  However, following the 2000 election, Lien put pressure on Lee, who gladly stepped down from his post as chairman of the KMT only to found the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) in time for the 2001 legislative elections.

  KMT voters supporting Lee shifted their support to the DPP, thereby greatly expanding the green camp's voter base, as was seen in the number of votes it generated in the 2001 legislative elections and the 2002 Kaohsiung mayoral election.

  But this year's presidential election is a competition between two candidates, and the DPP has to get half of all votes if it is to win the election. This is a hard win, and the secretary general to the Presidential Office did not exaggerate when he called it a cutthroat battle.

  Today, the situation is split 50-50 between the two camps, and it is not at all certain that the pan-blue camp will win. Almost 2 million people participated in the 228 Hand-in-Hand Rally and support for Chen is on the rise.

  In addition, it is worth noticing the change in public opinion in Taiwan between 2000 and this year. In proposing one country on each side of the Taiwan Strait, the referendum, and the writing of a new constitution, Chen has felt the pulse of Taiwanese society. He has used this to square off the blue/old against the green/new. If the green ticket wins, Taiwanese identity will grow stronger, and the two main strands in this awareness -- democratization and localization -- will become integrated.

  If the Lien-Soong ticket wins, it will be impossible to return to a pre-Lee style party rule, but it is also a certainty that there will be fierce conflict with forces favoring localization.

  Such polarized opposition, with the addition of the power struggle between green and blue parties, will lead to increased turbulence in Taiwanese society.

  There are other problems attached to a Lien-Soong win.

  The first problem is that Lien and Soong are backed by the KMT and the PFP, respectively, and that the PFP holds a certain number of seats in the legislature. Behind the "empty post" of a vice president, Soong would have real legislative support. How should power then be divided between president and vice president?

  The second problem relates to the question of whether the KMT and the PFP are two parties or one. If two, then how should all the graces be divided? How should Cabinet posts be divided to avoid infighting? In the year-end legislative elections, the two parties will be fighting for the same voters. Should the president campaign for KMT candidates while the vice president campaigns for PFP candidates? If they form one party after the election, then who should take over the chairmanship, and how should power be divided within the party?

  The third problem is that Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and legislative speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) share the No. 2 position within the KMT, and their supporters have already split up into factions. If the KMT once again becomes the ruling party, it will not be able to handle its internal problems, and it will also have to deal with the PFP factor.

  We can only imagine the intensity of the power struggles that would ensue.

  Lien, Soong, the KMT and the PFP insist on putting the issue of the power formula aside. If they lose the election, Lien and Soong will no longer be able to run their parties, Lien in particular, and they will have no choice but to retire.

  The KMT's localization faction will grow stronger and the KMT will have to deal with tension resulting from being forced by circumstance to desinicize and localize.

  A defeat may not only cause the KMT to collapse, but the handling of party assets, party-run businesses and the remaining huge body of retired staff will pose difficult problems in future.

  Soong's PFP must give priority to three issues.

  First, will they be able to survive without Soong's leadership? Second, should they merge with the KMT in order to defeat the DPP and the TSU? Third, what strategy should they adopt in the year-end legislative elections? Since Lien and Soong joined hands, PFP supporters have shifted their support to the KMT. Will the PFP get another lease on life?

  Regardless of whether the DPP manages to remain in power, the TSU will be the biggest winner in this year's election. If the DPP wins and the KMT disintegrates, the TSU will, on the one hand, be able to attract what the DPP calls "fundamental votes."

  On the other hand, the TSU will also attract voters supporting the KMT's localization faction, and they may even be able to attract politicians from that faction. The TSU will then have the chance of growing into a major party in the year-end legislative elections.

  If Chen's re-election bid is successful, the DPP will have laid the foundation for a long-term hold on power. If the DPP, which only commanded 40 percent

  of the political map in 2000, manages a win this year, it will not only be a matter of great quantitative growth, but it will also signify a qualitative change showing the Taiwanese people's determination to cast off 50 years of KMT rule.

  A victory for a Taiwanese localization government will inevitably mean the beginning of the legislative election campaign and a legislative majority for the DPP and the TSU. At the same time, it will also signal the start of DPP-TSU interparty competition.

  Regardless, Taiwanese development will enter a new historic process and China will have

  to rethink its strategies. In particular, defeat for the KMT would mean that the civil war framework connected to the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) would collapse, and the CCP would have to make changes to its "one China" principle.

  The US' "one China" policy would also be challenged.

  A win by the Lien-Soong ticket would leave Chen with two choices: continue as chairman of the DPP and try again in 2008, or retire from politics and assist the DPP from the outside. The DPP has Taipei County Commissioner Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) in the north and Kaohsiung Mayor Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) in the south, and a new generation will bring new people.

  The DPP and the TSU would both compete and integrate. Relying on a flourishing Taiwan awareness, the green camp is already becoming difficult to stop. As time goes by, it will grow, not shrink, and put heavy pressure on the KMT.

  This year's presidential election represents a major choice for the people of Taiwan. Will the winner be a China-toting KMT

  or a DPP using "Taiwan" as its slogan?

  We will know the answer on March 20.

  Chin Heng-wei is the editor in chief of Contemporary Monthly magazine.

  Translated by Perry Svensson
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