More than a week has passed since Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Central Committee member Sean Lien (連勝文) was shot and a bystander killed at an election rally for KMT Sinbei City councilor candidate Chen Hung-yuan (陳鴻源). In spite of the public’s desire to see the facts revealed as soon as possible, President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration has not produced a detailed report on investigations into who planned the attack. The slow pace of the investigation makes it impossible to dispel uncertainties and halt the spread of rumors.
It is widely believed that the shooting influenced the result of the next day’s elections. If so, then Taiwan is well on the way to being run by gangsters. If, having succeeded once in changing the course of an election, those with evil intentions were encouraged to do more of the same, it would be a grave setback for Taiwan’s democracy. Therefore, we urgently need to work out what changes need to be made to the system to prevent this, to stop the spread of illegal weapons and stem the influence of criminal gangs.
It could be that those in authority are so satisfied that the incident helped to win the elections that they aren’t thinking very hard about how to prevent such a thing happening again. Therefore, the government must be monitored closely and pressed to quickly come up with effective measures in response.
Ma is head of state, but so far his response to this shocking crime has been very disturbing. Even as the underworld rides roughshod over his authority as leader, using violence to effect who gets what share of political power, Ma seems quite unconcerned. In fact, he can hardly hide his glee about the unexpected windfall the incident brought his party in terms of votes.
He found time to be a volunteer worker at the Presidential Office, taking telephone enquiries from the public instead of focusing on how to stop Taiwan’s democracy from rotting. One can only conclude that power and authority have gone to his head.
Rather than ordering those attending the KMT’s weekly Zhongshan meeting not to talk about the shooting, the president should be actively facing the wound this unfortunate incident has inflicted on the country and its people. He should be working with the departments responsible for investigating the motives of the shooting suspect, Lin Cheng-wei (林正偉), and finding the masterminds behind the attack. Ma should be urging the investigators to swiftly give the public an account of what really happened.
Besides that, there is much more that needs to be done to avoid confrontation between the governing and opposition camps over the issue and to preserve social harmony. Ma should not need to be reminded about what he should be doing at this time.
Even if Ma is unwilling to admit that the shooting had something to do with the KMT’s winning three out of the five municipal mayorships, he should face up to the fact that nearly every KMT election rally on the night of Nov. 26 sought to connect the shooting with how people should vote the next day.
Emotive exhortations such as: “Don’t let Sean Lien’s blood flow in vain,” “Use your vote to punish violence” and “Cast your vote for justice for Sean Lien” were heard at rallies everywhere, even though the facts of the case were far from clear.
While KMT candidates may have made personal gains from this kind of manipulation, it could only further cloud the true circumstances of the incident and broaden its consequences.
While the KMT gained something in the short term, it risks greater losses in the long term if there is a backlash to this manipulation. Once the situation has calmed down and as the facts of the case gradually become clear, voters will look back at what happened and ask themselves what logical connection there could really be between choosing competent mayors and letting somebody’s blood flow “in vain.”
Since the other political parties were not behind the violence, why should they be punished at the ballot box? Since those party are innocent, why should they have been denied the right to compete fairly based on their ability to govern? When people have had time to reflect on these questions, they will get the feeling that they have been fooled and the effect of this backlash is hard to predict.
Now both the pan-blue and pan-green camps have had the experience of benefiting or losing in a vote following a shooting incident. On March 19, 2004, two bullets were fired at a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) motorcade, injuring then-president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and then-vice president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮).
Nov. 26, just one bullet flew, although it claimed two victims. The number of bullets may be different, but the air of suspicion is the same. The two parties should empathize with one another and work together rationally to ensure that the fairness of elections is never again compromised by one-off incidents.
However, Minister of the Interior Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺), speaking in the legislature after the election, said there was no analogy between the “two-bullet” and “one-bullet” incidents.
Jiang’s statement was inappropriate and likely to stoke animosity between followers of the two camps. A bullet injures its target just the same no matter which party the victim belongs to.
Lien has been cared for at National Taiwan University Hospital. When Chen and Lu were hit, it was Chi Mei Medical Center that looked after them. What is the difference? Jiang should have higher moral standards than this and now is the time for people in Taiwan to start learning how to talk to each other in a civilized way.
Ma must pay serious attention to the deterioration of law and order. As the head of government, he cannot shirk this responsibility. It must also be asked whether Taiwan’s election and recall laws make it too easy for criminals to play dirty tricks. The governing and opposition parties should reach a consensus on the need to thoroughly review these laws.
For instance, the Presidential and Vice Presidential Election and Recall Act (總統副總統選舉罷免法) stipulates that a presidential election must be suspended if one of the presidential candidates dies, but the death of a vice presidential candidate would not have the same effect.
The Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法), as amended in 2007, also only calls for an election to be halted if a candidate dies. In the 2004 shooting Chen and Lu were injured but not killed, so the election went ahead, but supporters of their KMT-People First Party rivals, Lien’s father Lien Chan (連戰) and James Soong (宋楚瑜), thought that the shooting altered the result of the election the next day to favor of Chen and Lu.
Sean Lien was injured and a bystander killed, but neither of them was a candidate, so the special municipalities elections were held as scheduled, but, as former KMT chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) said, no one could honestly say that the incident didn’t influence the vote.
That being the case, what can be done to stop those who seek to change the course of history by means of criminal acts? When such unfortunate events happen, how can politicians be prevented from using such incidents to drum up support at the ballot box? Is it right that elections should be suspended only when someone dies? Should we also consider suspending elections when the victim of an attack is someone other than a candidate?
On the other hand, any change may create situations where those who want to see an election suspended may resort to desperate acts to achieve those ends, and this also cannot be allowed. It will take a lot of serious thought to find the optimum solution and make suitable adjustments to the electoral laws.
Just as the KMT declared that the election following the 2004 shooting was unfair, this latest election has also been unfair to the DPP and the 49.87 percent of voters who cast their ballots in its support.
The number of DPP voters exceeded KMT voters by more than 400,000 and the DPP nearly won an outright majority of votes overall. This shows that most people refuse to let the criminal underworld run this country and won’t allow bullets to decide who wins and loses at the ballot box.
If Ma doesn’t want to rule in ignominy, he must quickly come up with solutions that get to the root of the problem.
TRANSLATED BY JULIAN CLEGG
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