Two days before the KMT closes its five-month-long membership re-registration, the party said it was satisfied to have had more than 910,000 party faithful re-register as KMT members.
"We are happy to see that there are over 100,000 new members. But for those who are not identified with the party, we do not intend to seek them out [to re-register]," said the director of the KMT's department of organizational management, Chen Tai-i (
Compared to its previous claim to have 2.5 million members, the new figure seems to be a sign of the party's difficulty in transforming itself into a genuine democratic political party. But some top leaders disagreed.
"In a democratic society, there won't be too many people who bear strong partisan identities. However, this will be a milestone of whether the KMT will accomplish its democratization [within the party]," associate professor of politics at the Soochow University, Hsieh Chen-yu (
Another associate professor at the same university, Emile Sheng (
"I would say that if half of its members joined the party just for the sake of the party's reinforcement instead of taking advantage of some insurance coverage or other promotional benefit, the party's morale will be boosted," Sheng added.
Sheng also said he has doubts about party Chairman Lien Chan's (
"Unlike former Chairman Lee who was seen as a political strongman, Lien's political charisma does not stand out. Therefore, at a time when [the KMT] needs a great deal of dash, his role as a party leader becomes less competitive [than People First Party Chairman James Soong (
As far as political reorganization is concerned, senior member of the PFP Liu Sung-pan (
Sheng disagreed, saying that both parties were unlikely to cooperate with each other since they would be competitors in the elections. Hsieh said the KMT would develop different cooperation models with various political parties depending on the political issue concerned.
The KMT will hold its first direct election for party chairmanship on March 24.
This year all 910,000 party members will be entitled to cast their vote for the new chairman whereas, in the past, only some 2,000 party representatives had the right to vote for the chairmanship.
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