The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairmanship election promises to be a "winner takes all" event. Both Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) and Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) are chomping at the bit, for he who wins the race becomes master, the number one man in the party. This is especially true given the KMT's pyramidal power structure. The outcome of the election will set the players' relative positions in the party hierarchy -- who is in control and who is controlled -- in stone.
The contest between Ma and Wang does more than merely reflect how the party-state system, present in Taiwan for the past half century, has developed. The victor will have an immediate influence on the party's actions and development, because of the men's inherent differences.
Ma hails from a Mainlander background; he is a member of the party aristocracy. Wang, on the other hand, is born-and-bred Taiwanese, from Minnan stock -- a local who has become part of the party-state system. They have similarities and differences, they represent different ideals and have their own political capital. It is worth speculating as to who may win, and what will be the effects of each victory. More significantly, this election will influence the 2008 presidential elections, and therefore is important to Taiwan's future.
In terms of the KMT itself, Ma holds considerable sway, and enjoys wide support. Above and beyond his own charisma, there is his ethnic background, and many see him as the natural heir to the KMT throne. It is because of the party-state nature of the KMT that Ma is able to use this "status" to put pressure on Chairman Lien Chan (連戰), and make use of his charisma to undercut Wang.
That is also why Ma has his sights set far beyond the party chairmanship: he is looking to the 2008 presidential election. That is to say, he is embroiled in two fights here: he has to win the chairmanship battle without jeopardizing his chances of securing the presidency, and thus win the war. This can be seen from Ma's statements regarding "the road to be taken by the KMT, and the direction its development takes" during the recent KMT Central Standing Committee meeting.
Ma emphasized the KMT's "achievements," declared that the KMT was not a political party from outside Taiwan, and linked the history of the party with the blood and sweat shed by Taiwan's former champions. He was even able to contort the facts enough to say "with all certainty" that the KMT had laid the political foundations on which Taiwan's democracy has been built. And when he talked about the necessity of "loving Taiwan," he compared it to the act of breathing.
Originally, Ma had wanted to condescend to Wang, playing the tried-and-tested ploy of relying on his high credentials. He was not expecting Wang to use his pull in the legislature to commandeer a frigate to take to the high seas in "protection" of fishermen's rights. This move stumped Ma, it was going right into home territory and appealing to the powerful veterans voting bloc.
This is Ma's Achilles' heel, and any damage sustained could bring his whole campaign crashing down. Then there is Wang's "local" ticket, his crucial role in the presidential elections, legislative elections and National Assembly elections, and Lien's endorsement, which give Wang a considerable advantage.
Ma then called out party heavyweights such as former premier Hau Pei-tsun (郝柏村), Hsu Li-lung (許歷農) and Wang Chien-shien (王建宣) to support his candidacy, which in all honesty was probably more of a panic measure than part of the original master plan.
It seems that Ma's "ethnic ticket" ploy has been completely upstaged by Wang's maneuvering, forcing Ma to pull out his ace.
Ma may well win on the ethnic ticket, but the fact that he has been forced by Wang into making a clear distinction between "foreign" and "local" to win means that his hope of combining the campaigns for the chairmanship with the 2008 presidential election will have been frustrated.
Chin Heng-wei is editor-in-chief of Contemporary Monthly magazine.
TRANSLATED BY PAUL COOPER
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