China won't give Ma an easy ride: ex-MAC official

Managing cross-strait relations will not be easy for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) if it wins the 2008 presidential election, given the commitments it has made to the Chinese government, a former cross-strait affairs official said yesterday.

"Many of the commitments will actually be difficult to carry out even if the KMT gains power in 2008," said Chen Ming-tong (陳明通), a former vice-chairman of the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), at a book release press conference.

"Cross-strait relations will only get worse as a result of its failure to fulfill the commitments," the official said.

"I was invited to Beijing early last month for an academic exchange. They said it seemed to them that [KMT Chairman] Ma Ying-jeou [馬英九] was still living in the anti-communist era. They said that Beijing won't give Ma an easy time handling cross-strait affairs," Chen said.

Ma is widely touted as the most likely candidate to represent the pan-blue camp -- the KMT and its political ally the People First Party -- in the 2008 presidential election.

Given that Ma might win the 2008 election and that he may not be as sympathetic to China as former KMT chairman Lien Chan (連戰) was, Chen said that Beijing has been trying to tame him for quite a while.

"Lien's trip to China this year and the communique he signed with Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) were part of China's strategy to make Ma more docile toward Beijing," Chen said.

The communique outlined the common goals of the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for cross-strait policy, such as sticking to the "1992 consensus," which recognizes the "one China" principle, and opposing Taiwan's independence, among others.

While the CCP has been eager to realize the communique's principles, many Taiwanese oppose the parties' political goals, Chen said.

It might be easy for an opposition party to sign such a communique with China, but it will discover the consequences should it take the office, Chen said.

MAC Chairman Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said that the KMT's move to negotiate with China and then ask the government to accept the result had been a big blow to the spirit of democracy and had had negative influence on the MAC.