The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) developed a bad habit during the years of one-party rule. It acts like a powerful family, with officials behaving like privileged kids relying on the power of their parents; smiling, gentle boys and elegant girls. Although everything they do is an example of incompetence, they always look good on the surface.
However, when faced with rejection, they become angry, vulgar and stop at nothing.
The KMT fielded a presidential candidate and then sought to change the rules of the game. It has engaged in endless infighting as supporters of Deputy Legislative Speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) — who won party presidential primaries — clash with her detractors.
Hung said she would rather die than withdraw her candidacy and the old guard said they would kill her if she did not. Those who want to run in the election cannot do so, while those who said they would not run might end up in the race. Nobody knows what is true and what is false.
The second-rate drama has not yet seen the final curtain, but it exposed the party’s true face.
The KMT Central Standing Committee’s support for Hung, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) not becoming a candidate and Hung saying she would rather die than withdraw from the race are all falsehoods; the only truth is that Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) has once again come under attack.
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) did not explicitly prevent Wang from running in the presidential election. He just set up Hung to grab the nomination, which acted as a deterrent. Wang was far too dignified to pick a fight in the primaries with his deputy. He was tied down, but Hung still felt the force of the hostile party machine and was left alone, floundering. Her popularity did not pick up, but some still shouted “down with Wang” and let Chu play the heroic savior by giving the New Taipei City mayor a free ride into the presidential race.
Now that it has been decided that Hung is to be replaced, Chu has come up with three bandages to cover the party’s wounds: KMT Secretary-General Lee Shu-chuan (李四川) represented the KMT in its public apology to Hung; substantial funds are to be given to KMT legislative candidates to keep them silent; and party members have been told that any calls for keeping Hung would cause the KMT’s campaign to collapse, and both the nation and the party would be subjugated.
The three measures have had some effect: Wang’s supporters have gone quiet, while deep-blue supporters are once again chanting about voting despite themselves. Chu is likely to use money to hush Taiwan-centric KMT supporters, and use plots and schemes to trick the deep-blue supporters.
The two most important things are to apologize to the deep blues and block Wang.
Before the primaries, party bigwigs stopped Wang by saying that if he were to run for president, the party would be killed off. Now, to replace Hung, the new slogan is that if Hung is not replaced, both the nation and the party would go under — and Chu is the knight in shining armor.
The information held by the deep blues in the Huang Fu-hsing (黃復興) military veteran branch is limited and they always listen to the instructions of those in higher positions; they are the KMT’s most loyal troops.
Chu is paving the way for himself and he is using the false issue of “death of the party, death of the nation” to deceive and intimidate supporters.
Chu and Ma are two of a kind — they would do anything to triumph in the infighting, including buying votes and cheating.
James Wang is a commentator in Taipei.
Translated by Clare Lear
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