It is common to refer to the period of authoritarian rule under the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) from the implementation of martial law on May 20, 1949, until its abolition on June 3, 1991, as the White Terror era.
Since the first direct presidential election in 1996, the KMT and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) have taken turns in governing, each maintaining a support base of at least 30 percent. With the inevitable re-evaluation of 23 million voters after each four-year term, incumbent parties are also obliged to court swing voters outside their traditional base to remain in office. Under such a system, where could there possibly be room for a new “white terror”?
Established in 2019, the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) has branded itself as the “white” camp to carve out a piece of the political landscape outside of the blue-green dichotomy. Although the TPP has never held national office, the words and actions alone of its members are enough to impart a foreboding sense of a new kind of white terror.
Core Pacific Group chairman Sheen Ching-jing (沈慶京), claiming to act as an ordinary Taipei citizen, obtained concessions of more than NT$10 billion (US$329.6 million) from then-Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), the founder of the TPP. We are asked to believe that all this is “perfectly legal.”
Furthermore, if Ko’s then-secretary Hsu Chih-yu (許芷瑜) truly has no skeletons in the closet, why does she not board the next flight back to Taipei and testify to Ko’s innocence? Political donations attested to in court were not found in official TPP bank accounts — and yet the party still makes claims of openness and transparency.
Finally, regarding the TPP’s young supporters: Is it that they do not understand, or that they do not care? Is it not important that this party, which has not even come close to winning the presidency, is already proving its corruption?
Dissatisfaction with the “status quo” and a pursuit of novelty are the hallmarks of youth. Between the DPP, the KMT and the TPP, the political landscape is changing. Young people have little interest in the old KMT, and take the democratic freedoms hard-won by their predecessors for granted. They show limited awareness of and vigilance toward the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and the DPP’s “resist China, protect Taiwan” stance is no longer a silver bullet for the youth vote. Enthusiasm has begun to coalesce around the TPP as an emerging political party promising rationality, pragmatism and a scientific approach.
Where is the rationality behind young TPP supporters verbally abusing prosecutors and judges, running riot in prohibited areas, and mowing down on-duty police officers — with TPP Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) appearing to give a public demonstration on how to put an officer into a chokehold. Where is the pragmatism when people turn up to their unauthorized gatherings with clothes emblazoned with the five stars of the Chinese flag? Where is the objectivity in refusing to accept the evidence and numerous confessions from those involved in the Core Pacific City corruption case?
Our nation’s hope for the future resides with the young. However, we see young TPP supporters with complete disregard for the law and contempt for differing opinions in the judiciary blindly sticking to their guns and refusing to accept hard evidence. They seem to have made it their goal to provoke President William Lai (賴清德) at every opportunity, and remain uninterested in stopping their protest group from flying the Chinese flag.
What are we to make of the new TPP, marred blue with the KMT, red with the CCP and black with corruption? What future would come of this white terror?
Chang Kuo-tsai is a retired National Hsinchu University associate professor.
Translated by Gilda Knox Streader
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