The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has entered the presidential primary stage. Unlike the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), the DPP is the ruling party and is responsible for administering the central government and must fulfill its contract with voters until May 19 next year.
At the moment, significant responsibility falls on Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌), who should demand that the entire administrative team stop acting like bystanders.
Starting from today, they should change their mindset and treat the coming year as their last year in power. The administration should make every effort to do what it wants to and should do, and concentrate on policy implementation.
If it does not seize this opportunity, things will not be the same next time around.
So where should the party begin? Perhaps with its attitude.
In the past, it had a high-spirited and vigorous attitude and could handle pressing affairs slowly and calmly. Given the limited time available now, it would have to work hard day and night to review its policies, and complete all urgent tasks within a year.
Why is that? Since the beginning of its primary process, the party has faced the battle between President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and former premier William Lai (賴清德).
Some top officials privately complain that they do not know what they are fighting over and it seems as if they have become victims of the logic of power.
They do not seem to understand that in this democratic era, top officials in modern countries should devote themselves to the nation. They are paid by taxpayers, and are not anyone’s personal counselors who have nothing to do with the outcome of the primary.
It is the premier’s responsibility to change this atmosphere, and Su should take an iron-fist approach by telling his Cabinet members to do their best for the public until May 20 next year.
Officials are not men or women of leisure and they should keep busy doing things that matter. If they remain idle, they are a waste of money and should be sent packing.
Saying that would help Su score a few points with voters.
As the main force of stability, Su’s Cabinet has a lot to do in the coming year. One task is to ease the public anger that has been accumulating over the past three years.
How could Vice Premier Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) lose the Kaohsiung mayoral election in last year’s local elections?
One could easily come up with a long list of policies that ran against the public’s wishes. Surely this is something the experienced Su knows well.
Another task relates to Taiwan’s future, including issues that must be handled promptly and without political interference, regardless of whether the DPP remains in power.
These issues include pushing for legislation such as the establishment of a monitoring mechanism for cross-strait political negotiations, constant reform and streamlining of policies to offer greater convenience to the public and improving national competitiveness.
One of many examples is the creation of a single window for foreign investment in Taiwan.
It is only by realizing that time is running out and working harder that the government will be able to reshape expectations. If it does not, what does it matter who wins the DPP’s primary?
Besides, judging from the rapid political shifts nowadays, voters will have to be prepared for one-term presidencies becoming the norm. Anyone hoping to serve two four-year terms will have their work cut out for them.
Tzou Jiing-wen is editor-in-chief of the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper).
Translated by Eddy Chang
Taiwan stands at the epicenter of a seismic shift that will determine the Indo-Pacific’s future security architecture. Whether deterrence prevails or collapses will reverberate far beyond the Taiwan Strait, fundamentally reshaping global power dynamics. The stakes could not be higher. Today, Taipei confronts an unprecedented convergence of threats from an increasingly muscular China that has intensified its multidimensional pressure campaign. Beijing’s strategy is comprehensive: military intimidation, diplomatic isolation, economic coercion, and sophisticated influence operations designed to fracture Taiwan’s democratic society from within. This challenge is magnified by Taiwan’s internal political divisions, which extend to fundamental questions about the island’s identity and future
The narrative surrounding Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s attendance at last week’s Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit — where he held hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin and chatted amiably with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) — was widely framed as a signal of Modi distancing himself from the US and edging closer to regional autocrats. It was depicted as Modi reacting to the levying of high US tariffs, burying the hatchet over border disputes with China, and heralding less engagement with the Quadrilateral Security dialogue (Quad) composed of the US, India, Japan and Australia. With Modi in China for the
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has postponed its chairperson candidate registration for two weeks, and so far, nine people have announced their intention to run for chairperson, the most on record, with more expected to announce their campaign in the final days. On the evening of Aug. 23, shortly after seven KMT lawmakers survived recall votes, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) announced he would step down and urged Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) to step in and lead the party back to power. Lu immediately ruled herself out the following day, leaving the subject in question. In the days that followed, several
The Jamestown Foundation last week published an article exposing Beijing’s oil rigs and other potential dual-use platforms in waters near Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙島). China’s activities there resembled what they did in the East China Sea, inside the exclusive economic zones of Japan and South Korea, as well as with other South China Sea claimants. However, the most surprising element of the report was that the authors’ government contacts and Jamestown’s own evinced little awareness of China’s activities. That Beijing’s testing of Taiwanese (and its allies) situational awareness seemingly went unnoticed strongly suggests the need for more intelligence. Taiwan’s naval
RSS