President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Saturday last week spoke at the opening of the Ching-kuo Chi-hai Cultural Park (經國七海文化園區) and the Chiang Ching-kuo Presidential Library in Taipei.
Despite drawing criticism from all sides for doing so, she was able to kill five birds with one stone.
The first was in the grace and generosity she displayed. Tsai spoke positively about Chiang Ching-kuo’s (蔣經國) staunchly anti-communist stance, highlighting the ridiculousness of the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) position of working with the Chinese Communist Party.
This was a slap in the face to pan-blue camp leaders such as former vice president Lien Chan (連戰), former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), former KMT vice chairman Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) and KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), who were in the audience and must have felt uncomfortable.
The gesture was also good for national unity, making Tsai look like a president for all Taiwanese, no matter their political views.
A My-Formosa.com poll showed that the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has an approval rating of 46.3 percent, compared with a 23.7 percent approval and 63 percent disapproval rating for the KMT.
Tsai showed grace in her capacity as DPP chairperson to enter the library built to honor Chiang. Can anyone imagine Chu walking into the Nylon Cheng Liberty Foundation and Memorial Museum, built in honor of democracy advocate Deng Nan-jung (鄭南榕)?
Nobody is happier than Beijing to see a divided Taiwan, and Tsai has shown herself to be the first to offer an olive branch to her political rivals.
No politician is perfect, and that is certainly true for Chiang. Taiwanese cannot, and should not, forgive or forget his connection to the deaths of democracy advocate Chen Wen-chen (陳文成) and the mother and twin daughters of former DPP chairman Lin I-hsiung (林義雄), or his role in the Kaohsiung Incident trials.
Tsai did not seek to absolve Chiang of his sins. She only recognized his anti-communist stance. In no way should her words be seen as a betrayal of the DPP’s long-held position on Chiang’s autocratic regime.
Second, she showed true grit and self-assurance by walking into the deep-blue lair, where anyone present could make a scene, or even put her personal safety at risk.
Her self-assuredness was in no small part due to her party’s victories last month with the failure of the four referendum proposals and DPP Legislator Lin Ching-yi’s (林靜儀) win in Taichung’s second district legislative by-election.
Third, Tsai has placed the cat firmly among the pigeons in the KMT camp, causing internal turmoil in a party petrified that she, having commandeered the Republic of China (ROC), is going to run off with Chiang, a symbol of the KMT’s glory days.
It is no wonder that former TVBS news anchor Lee Yen-chiou (李艷秋) said: “If even Chiang Ching-kuo has become one of the DPP’s assets, what does the KMT have left?”
This has really hit the pan-blue camp where it hurts.
Fourth, Tsai’s appearance at the park’s opening ceremony shows that she has consolidated her power. Naturally, there are those within the DPP who will criticize her for speaking at the event, but she will hopefully be able to leverage her high level of support — she has a 54 percent approval rating and 53 percent confidence rating, the My-Formosa.com poll showed — to persuade the pro-independence camp and opponents within her party to trust her.
Finally, she might win over moderate blue voters, more of whom view Chiang positively than negatively. If you do not enter the tiger’s lair, how will you steal the cubs?
The KMT often says it holds Chiang in high esteem, but this has become little more than a slogan, as it has essentially abandoned his core values, and it is Tsai who is standing up to the Chinese communists.
The blame lies at the feet of Ma, who during his presidency promised to steer clear of the topics of unification, independence and defense, and since then has gone from “not speaking of unification” to “not ruling unification out.”
Fan Shih-ping is a professor in National Taiwan Normal University’s Department of East Asian Studies.
Translated by Paul Cooper
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