James Soong (宋楚瑜) stunned political circles when he chose Chang Chao-hsiung (張昭雄), President of Chang Gung University (長庚大學), as his running mate. More surprising is the fact that Chang has close links with both the KMT and DPP. He is good friends with both Premier Siew and DPP candidate Chen Shui-bian, and has been a generous patron of the DPP for some time. The Chang Gung Community (including the university, hospital and surrounding residential communities, all run by the Formosa Group) is also well-known for its enthusiastic support of the DPP ticket. Yet for all of this, Chang chose to run with James Soong. What's the deal?
Soong's choice of Chang is not that surprising. For Soong, Chang has three advantages. First, Chang will help Soong to dodge the issue of ethnicirty. With a strong native Taiwanese identity and close connections with opposition groups, Chang will deflect some voters' unease about Soong's mainland Chinese background. Next, Chang's involvement in the Formosa Plastics empire will help Soong to curry favor with its chairman, Wang Yung-ching (王永慶), and tap into local business support. Last, Chang will bolster Soong's image as being above party politics and distance Soong from internal KMT squabbles.
In short, Chang is just what Soong needs to fend off both KMT and DPP attacks.
Soong is conscious of Chang's importance, shown when he put Chang in charge of drawing up a China policy soon after he was announced as Soong's running mate, silencing attacks from the other parties. Some have attacked Chang for "betraying the opposition party," but Chang replied: "The only betrayal possible is a betrayal of the people," adding to Soong's appeal to voters dissatisfied with the ruling party.
Unlike KMT and DPP vice-presidential candidates Vincent Siew (蕭萬長) and Anette Lu (呂秀蓮), Chang is without political experience, but this just makes it more difficult for opponents to target his weak spots. Chang's connections with the opposition, his clean image and his background with Formosa Plastics (台塑) make Chang someone who could add a lot to Soong's campaign. But this depends on the interaction between Soong and Chang.
Chang's opposition party connections will also help Soong to tone down his own KMT dominated past, but this may not last. Soong's camp is dominated by former KMT members who were with him when he was Provincial Governor. Even if Wu Po-hsiung (吳伯雄), current senior advisor to the president, Wu Tun-yi (吳敦義), previous mayor of Kaohsiung, and former Minister of Justice Liao Cheng-hao (廖正豪) announce their support for Soong, his power base will remain firmly in the non-mainstream faction of the KMT. Only the addition of influential non-KMT members will change this.
Overall, Soong's selection of Chang is favorable for Soong in the short-term, and may work to Soong's advantage in the long-term if the two are able to cooperate well. His entry into the race seems to have cast a pall over both the KMT and DPP camps. If Chang can help prevent the specter of ethnicirty from being raised in the election, and reduce some of the mud-slinging, then whatever the results, it will be a victory for democracy in Taiwan.
Julian Kuo is assistant professor of Political Science at Soochow University.
The image was oddly quiet. No speeches, no flags, no dramatic announcements — just a Chinese cargo ship cutting through arctic ice and arriving in Britain in October. The Istanbul Bridge completed a journey that once existed only in theory, shaving weeks off traditional shipping routes. On paper, it was a story about efficiency. In strategic terms, it was about timing. Much like politics, arriving early matters. Especially when the route, the rules and the traffic are still undefined. For years, global politics has trained us to watch the loud moments: warships in the Taiwan Strait, sanctions announced at news conferences, leaders trading
Eighty-seven percent of Taiwan’s energy supply this year came from burning fossil fuels, with more than 47 percent of that from gas-fired power generation. The figures attracted international attention since they were in October published in a Reuters report, which highlighted the fragility and structural challenges of Taiwan’s energy sector, accumulated through long-standing policy choices. The nation’s overreliance on natural gas is proving unstable and inadequate. The rising use of natural gas does not project an image of a Taiwan committed to a green energy transition; rather, it seems that Taiwan is attempting to patch up structural gaps in lieu of
The Executive Yuan and the Presidential Office on Monday announced that they would not countersign or promulgate the amendments to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) passed by the Legislative Yuan — a first in the nation’s history and the ultimate measure the central government could take to counter what it called an unconstitutional legislation. Since taking office last year, the legislature — dominated by the opposition alliance of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party — has passed or proposed a slew of legislation that has stirred controversy and debate, such as extending
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators have twice blocked President William Lai’s (賴清德) special defense budget bill in the Procedure Committee, preventing it from entering discussion or review. Meanwhile, KMT Legislator Chen Yu-jen (陳玉珍) proposed amendments that would enable lawmakers to use budgets for their assistants at their own discretion — with no requirement for receipts, staff registers, upper or lower headcount limits, or usage restrictions — prompting protest from legislative assistants. After the new legislature convened in February, the KMT joined forces with the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) and, leveraging their slim majority, introduced bills that undermine the Constitution, disrupt constitutional
RSS