The office of former vice president Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) on Friday said that he would hold a news conference tomorrow morning, where he is expected to announce his bid for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) leadership.
That would pit him against KMT Vice Chairman Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), who said on Facebook yesterday morning that he would run in the KMT chairperson election race against Chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱).
Every government needs a strong opposition to keep it in check, provide oversight and ensure it implements policy effectively and in the interests of the nation. The KMT is the most viable opposition right now. Unfortunately, it is flailing without sound leadership that can alter its course to make it a better representative of the will of the people.
Wu has extensive experience in office, having served as a Taipei city councilor, Nantou County commissioner, Kaohsiung mayor, premier and vice president. A senior party member, Wu served as interim KMT chairman in December 2014 after then-president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) stepped down as the party’s leader following the KMT’s nine-in-one elections rout and has long been regarded as a potential party chairman by legislative members, admittedly in a field of a mere few.
Hau served as Taipei mayor from 2006 to 2014.
Although Hung was a legislator from 1990 until last year, which included four years as deputy legislative speaker, many in the party are opposed to her winning a second term. She owes her position to the spectacular leadership collapse during the KMT presidential primary last year. Then-KMT chairman and New Taipei City Mayor Eric Chu’s (朱立倫) handling of the debacle that followed and the electoral drubbing he subsequently reaped for his poor leadership and prevarication in the run-up to the election discount him from mounting a challenge for the leadership, even if he had the appetite for it.
That election clearly demonstrated people’s disapproval of Ma’s pro-China and pro-unification policies.
Hung, who is deeply committed to a Taiwan governed by the Republic of China (ROC), believes that there is only “one China,” but sees Taiwan’s future as unified with China, either by peaceful means or by force. For her, Taiwan is not a political entity.
The KMT must leave behind this view of a regime-in-exile. It no longer reflects the will of the majority of the public.
Despite inherent problems over the legitimacy and former practices of the KMT when it was the ruling party, it had, until recently, enjoyed the support of half of the population. Its travails over the past year, with its loss of the legislative majority and access to ill-gotten assets, are necessary, for it needs to morph into a new party that is representative of Taiwan, not the defunct ROC.
It needs to operate as an effective opposition that takes the nation’s interest, not its own, into account, leaving behind cyclical rubber-stamp legislatures bowing to the majority party’s whim. This is possible, as is evident in more mature democracies. For that, the KMT needs a strong leader, with experience and vision. That is not Hung.
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