President-elect William Lai (賴清德) and vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) take up their official positions tomorrow. Many of the new Cabinet members are not members of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
Among these are minister of economic affairs-designate J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) and minister of culture-designate Lee Yuan (李遠).
Such appointments are widely supported by all sides as they are closer to the ordinary Taiwanese.
Premier-designate Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) is also an unconventional politician. Although he faded from politics for some years after the DPP lost power in 2008, he persisted in his beliefs.
After the Sunflower movement in 2014, I saw him staging a silent sit-in protest at the corner of a small event, and almost no one recognized him.
In 2018, after the DPP suffered a serious defeat in the local elections, he became DPP chairman to deal with internal party disputes. As he can show deference, assert himself and is good at communicating, he can handle the current legislative situation.
Today, the biggest problem for the government lies in the Legislative Yuan, where the opposition camps have more legislative seats than the ruling camp.
The opposition parties have been making a large number of proposals in the name of “reforms,” trying to expand their power to paralyze the administration.
This kind of disrespect for the Constitution was even praised and supported by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) when a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) delegation led by KMT caucus whip Fu Kun-chi visited Beijing to communicate with the CCP. Only when Taiwan’s democratic system is in chaos can China’s authoritarian system look decent, and only when Taiwan is in chaos can China have an excuse to annex it.
However, there are also upright people among KMT lawmakers, such as Admiral Chen Yung-kang (陳永康). Chen is much better than General Wu Sz-huai (吳斯懷), a former KMT lawmaker, in terms of their political ideology, attitudes and performance.
Chen’s philosophy is different from that of the DPP, but he is still a military officer of the Republic of China (ROC). He has independent views, and does not follow the trend or remain silent.
Therefore, Fu would not dare to discipline him for not supporting a KMT lawmaker’s proposal, because Chen would be in the right.
Meanwhile, the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) serves most of the time as little more than a small pro-blue party. It has three internal factions, led by TPP Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) and TPP legislators Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) and Vivian Huang (黃珊珊).
Although there has been no recent cooperation between the DPP and TPP, perhaps the former can make friends with TPP legislators who seek common ground while reserving differences, especially after Ko recently ordered TPP lawmakers not to vote on a KMT proposal.
DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) is a politician who used to be good at compromising.
After he criticized Vivian Huang as “a female version of [Legislative Speaker] Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜)” during the speakership election, DPP lawmakers remained silent. This has contributed to the formation of the KMT-TPP partnership.
Instead, DPP lawmakers should be softer and more flexible, so as to avoid a “blue-green confrontation” between the ruling and opposition camps, while keeping the “ROC, Taiwan” as their first priority.
Paul Lin is a political commentator.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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