However tedious Taiwan's political scene has become recently, the battle for Taipei mayor promises to be an exception now that People First Party Chairman James Soong (
Following hot on the heels of eccentric independent Legislator Li Ao (
While rumors of Soong's intention to run have long been circulating, he has never confirmed them. Instead he has been busy touring Taipei over the last few months on so-called "inspection tours" to get the lowdown on issues that concern residents in the city's 12 districts.
Soong has also used former DPP chairman Shih Ming-teh's (
Soong's decision to run is more bad news for Ma, because it puts Soong in direct competition with Hau and could split the pan-blue vote, so it is likely to put pressure on the KMT and PFP to come to some sort of agreement in order to avoid what would be an embarrassing defeat.
But as PFP party caucus whip Lee Hung-chun (
Ma is also unlikely to drop Hau, as he was chosen using the KMT's new "democratic" primary system and Ma has personally endorsed his candidacy. Ma blasted the DPP for choosing Hsieh without the use of a proper selection process, so for Ma to drop Hau would be another hole in his already perforated armor of credibility.
But between Soong and Hau, it is the son of former premier Hau Pei-tsun (
Soong knows this and will use it to his advantage. Indeed, the KMT and PFP chiefs have already met to discuss the issue but to no avail.
With Li involved, at least we will be guaranteed that things will be eventful; the same goes for Chou, but realistically neither of them is likely to affect the overall result.
Soong's candidacy, if it happens, is great news for the DPP and the Hsieh camp, as two prominent pan-blue candidates would give Hsieh his best chance of winning this traditional KMT stronghold.
But with the pan-blue alliance loath to lose Taipei to the DPP like they did in 1994, when a New Party candidate and his KMT rival split the vote, we can expect the two parties to eventually thrash out some kind of deal.
And whatever kind of agreement the KMT and PFP come to -- if one is ever reached -- if it involves Hau or Soong stepping aside, then all Ma's talk of "high-class elections" and the "clean election pledge" policy he introduced last year will have gone out of the window, along with his lackluster efforts to reform the KMT and what little reputation he has left.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅?萁) has caused havoc with his attempts to overturn the democratic and constitutional order in the legislature. If we look at this devolution from the context of a transition to democracy from authoritarianism in a culturally Chinese sense — that of zhonghua (中華) — then we are playing witness to a servile spirit from a millennia-old form of totalitarianism that is intent on damaging the nation’s hard-won democracy. This servile spirit is ingrained in Chinese culture. About a century ago, Chinese satirist and author Lu Xun (魯迅) saw through the servile nature of
In their New York Times bestseller How Democracies Die, Harvard political scientists Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt said that democracies today “may die at the hands not of generals but of elected leaders. Many government efforts to subvert democracy are ‘legal,’ in the sense that they are approved by the legislature or accepted by the courts. They may even be portrayed as efforts to improve democracy — making the judiciary more efficient, combating corruption, or cleaning up the electoral process.” Moreover, the two authors observe that those who denounce such legal threats to democracy are often “dismissed as exaggerating or
Monday was the 37th anniversary of former president Chiang Ching-kuo’s (蔣經國) death. Chiang — a son of former president Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石), who had implemented party-state rule and martial law in Taiwan — has a complicated legacy. Whether one looks at his time in power in a positive or negative light depends very much on who they are, and what their relationship with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is. Although toward the end of his life Chiang Ching-kuo lifted martial law and steered Taiwan onto the path of democratization, these changes were forced upon him by internal and external pressures,
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus in the Legislative Yuan has made an internal decision to freeze NT$1.8 billion (US$54.7 million) of the indigenous submarine project’s NT$2 billion budget. This means that up to 90 percent of the budget cannot be utilized. It would only be accessible if the legislature agrees to lift the freeze sometime in the future. However, for Taiwan to construct its own submarines, it must rely on foreign support for several key pieces of equipment and technology. These foreign supporters would also be forced to endure significant pressure, infiltration and influence from Beijing. In other words,
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