Newly elected Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) should try to reconnect the party with Taiwanese society, or the KMT might never leave behind its role as an ineffective opposition.
The party’s chairperson election had been neglected by most Taiwanese until one of the four candidates, Sun Yat-sen School president Chang Ya-chung (張亞中), drew unprecedented attention with his vehement rhetoric during a televised debate on Sept. 4, appealing to far-right deep-blue supporters.
A TVBS poll conducted in the days after the debate showed that Chang had taken the lead from the more centrist Chu, a former New Taipei City mayor who led the party from 2015 to 2016, while incumbent KMT Chairman Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) had only 12.8 percent support.
Chu’s return to the chairmanship raises the question of whether he can give the KMT a new direction after Chiang’s leadership proved ineffective.
Ahead of the vote, Chiang said in a radio interview on Friday that the KMT chairman would have to work on a host of urgent tasks, including stabilizing the party, gearing up for four referendums in December, next year’s local elections and the 2024 presidential election.
While former Kaohsiung mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) did not publicly lobby for any of the four candidates, his shadow fell over their campaigns.
Chiang told the interviewer that he had spoken to Han by telephone, quoting him as saying that he did not favor any of the candidates. The statement was directed at Chu, who had often been seen with former Han aides on the campaign trail and had said that he was also in contact with Han.
Although Han was defeated by President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in last year’s presidential election and recalled by Kaohsiung voters a few months later, many KMT members still seem impressed by his ability to rally hundreds of thousands of supporters during his presidential campaign.
However, if the KMT remains unable to respond to the needs of Taiwanese society and remains obsessed with the craze about Han — a populist known for his inflated performances — the party will remain in opposition for many years to come.
The KMT leadership should switch its attention to the nation’s primary problems and ask itself whether the party can present better solutions than the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
While many countries are reopening their borders after COVID-19 travel restrictions, Taiwan’s strategy to safely follow suit needs deliberation. Whether the government has used relief funds efficiently also requires monitoring.
Meanwhile, the government has applied to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Many thorny issues are ensuing, including whether to lift a ban on certain food imports from Japan and how to mitigate the potential effect of joining the bloc on domestic industries.
It is time for the KMT to set aside its hostility toward Japan and demonstrate its ability to monitor the government’s CPTPP membership negotiations. Following its messy battle against US pork imports, the KMT should resort to rational and scientific arguments about Japanese food imports.
However, addressing its relations with Beijing perhaps remains the biggest challenge. At a time when more countries are joining the US’ efforts to rein in China’s hegemonic ambitions, the KMT needs to convince Taiwanese that it is not pro-China and is unwilling to sell out Taiwan, as the DPP claims.
With ever fewer Taiwanese being nostalgic about China — and the so-called “1992 consensus” being rejected by most members of the public, in which a majority identifies as Taiwanese, not Chinese — the KMT’s insistence on the “consensus” rings hollow.
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