Negative campaigning backfires in Kaohsiung

Frank Hsieh's (謝長廷) victory in Kaohsiung yesterday proves that negative campaigning and attempts by the pan-blue alliance to turn the election into a warm-up for the 2004 presidential elections in the end only backfired, political observers said.

The opposition's mudslinging and attempts to make their candidate, the KMT's Huang Jun-ying (黃俊英), appear to be racing ahead in the polls damaged their own campaign and worked to Hsieh's advantage, the observers said.

Expecting a tight race for the city, the blue camp sought to use it not only to defeat Hsieh but also to damage the central DPP administration.

The opposition billed it as a confidence vote on President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). The election came just weeks after farmers and fisherman took to the streets despite a government U-turn on agricultural finance and Chen's approval ratings slipped to their lowest point since he was elected.

But the opposition alliance was wrong in thinking that Kaohsiung voters could be swayed by such a strategy, said Cheng Cheng-yu (鄭政煜), executive director of the Southern Taiwan Society.

Cheng said that Kaohsiung voters, having experienced five decades of KMT rule, were unlikely to be persuaded that the opposition could do a better job.

"Kaohsiung is the grassroots base of Taiwan's democracy and the way people in the city think is totally different from those in Taipei," Cheng said.

"The KMT ruled the city for the past five decades and has been out of power for only a little less than four years. Efforts to convince voters that it was time to change parties were never going to have much of an effect on either DPP supporters or undecided voters," Cheng added.

"The KMT's continual criticism of Frank Hsieh and Chen Shui-bian and the lack of any concrete reform measures only irritated voters," Cheng said.

The KMT's use of the media to try to manipulate voters through the publication of polls and negative reports and mudslinging also backfired, said Kuan Pi-ling (管碧玲), Kaohsiung City Government spokeswoman.

"The results discredit their efforts," Kuan said.

When polls showed that Hsieh was lagging behind, it motivated undecided and even disillusioned voters to come forward and cast their votes, said Koai Kuang-wu (蒯光武), assistant professor at the Institute of Communication Management of National Sun Yat-san University.

Undecided voters accounted for some 25 percent of the electorate, but most are pro-reform, traditional supporters of the DPP. Even when campaigning turned negative, as long as Hsieh led in the polls, they remained aloof and felt he didn't need their support, Kaoi said.

"But in the last week, when the polls showed that Huang had moved ahead, it gave undecided voters a reason to cast their ballots because they started to feel they could make a difference," Koai said.

The fact that Hsieh promoted substantive policy measures rather than just negative accusations also helped him win the race, said Lee Chin-tan (李清潭), the dean of National Sun Yat-sen University's public administration department.

"This election was all about negative campaigning. It was full of rumors and vicious attacks and had very little to do with city affairs," Lee said.

"[But] in the end it was Hsieh's accomplishments over the past four years in Kaohsiung that enabled him to claw back voters' support," he said.