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Editorial: Two party politics is back

The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) will be breathing a collective sigh of relief today after a sustained period of electoral repudiation ended last night with its best performance since the 2004 presidential contest.

DPP Kaohsiung mayoral candidate Chen Chu (陳菊) was the star of the show, winning an impossibly tight contest over her Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) rival, Huang Chun-ying (黃俊英). Last night Huang joined a list of blue-camp sore losers by demanding that the election be annulled. His complaint seems grounded in outrage rather than evidence of wrongdoing, as with the aftermath of the 2004 presidential poll.

Chen ran a more vibrant campaign than Huang and defied pundits who predicted a grave fate for the DPP in the south over the conduct of the Presidential Office and MRT construction woes in Kaohsiung. Voters ignored Chen's invisible performance as a Cabinet minister and reconnected with her in a city that seems to expect more energy from its candidates than Taipei.

Taipei City provides a more interesting picture, however. DPP mayoral candidate Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) polled rather well considering his stillborn campaign, stealing a significant number of votes cast for Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) in 2002 away from the KMT's Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌). It is also likely that the lower voter turnout (64.52 percent) -- a probable function of a campaign that had no connection to the real lives of Taipei's residents -- hurt Hau more than Hsieh.

Hsieh's vote is respectable enough for him to stay in contention for the DPP nomination for president in 2008. Last night Hsieh's supporters were chanting "President Hsieh" in consolation and as a boost for his next campaign. And despite Hsieh lifting the DPP's vote by 5 percent on its 2002 result, the election was more notable for the ennui that cut into Hau's potential vote, despite Ma's backing, and the obliteration of People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜).

Indeed, the most important thing to come out of these contests is the crippling of the minor parties. Soong and his party are history. Humiliated after securing barely more than 4 percent of the vote, last night he said he would leave politics. His party's legislators, without their godfather and financier, can only return to the KMT fold or act as a temporary spoiler for the DPP until the next legislative election more or less wipes them out.

With a dysfunctional ex-candidate in Taipei and a dreadful performance in Kaohsiung, the Taiwan Solidarity Union's (TSU) unraveling is another demonstration of the marginalization of minor parties -- as well as the fact that former president and TSU "spiritual father" Lee Teng-hui's (李登輝) contribution to the bigger picture is highly overrated. A couple of pickups on the Taipei City Council are poor compensation for the damage it has sustained.

Even before the introduction of the new electoral system, it is clear that voters are tiring of clusters of splinter candidates with no coherent voice eating into the vote of major parties. After a period of extremes, Taiwanese are firming toward the center.
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