Asked about the Taiwan People’s Party’s (TPP) expulsion of its former legislator-at-large Li Zhenxiu (李貞秀), TPP founder and former chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) said, “she did it to herself.”
The circumstances leading to Li’s expulsion, and the increasingly ugly fallout that has since played out in the media, could have been avoided with a little more wisdom on the part of Ko and TPP Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌). Ko’s assessment of Li’s behavior could equally be applied to himself, Huang and the TPP’s internal processes.
Li, the first China-born spouse of a Taiwanese to serve as a lawmaker in Taiwan, was expelled following a unanimous vote by the party’s Central Evaluation Committee on Monday. The reasons given were Li’s repeated misconduct and comments that had “seriously damaged the party’s reputation and internal cohesion.”
The party neglected to mention Li’s ineligibility to serve as a legislator or its own insistence that she serve in that position, despite objections by the government and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), given the still unresolved issue of Li’s dual People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Republic of China (ROC) citizenship.
Li took her seat in the legislature in February, halfway through the legislative term due to the TPP’s “two-year” term rule, devised by Ko to provide legislative experience to the maximum number of party members.
During that time, the government and the DPP legislative caucus consistently raised concerns, despite the Central Election Commission’s approval of her candidacy, and legislative speaker Han Kuo-yu’s (韓國瑜) rejection of attempts to disqualify her.
Ko, Huang and the TPP backed her throughout, until concerns were raised by TPP members about her misconduct and inconvenient outbursts. Han, despite being a member of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), is expected to observe political neutrality in his capacity as legislative speaker. These are symptoms of the constitutional chaos that the KMT and TPP have been promoting in this legislative term.
The TPP’s headache does not end with Li’s expulsion. The party remains vulnerable to serious damage to its reputation and internal cohesion, with Li charging around like a bull in a China shop and appearing on pro-green talk shows where she criticized Huang — who she called a “hypocrite,” claiming that his continued leadership would lead to the death of the party — as well as TPP caucus director Vicky Chen (陳智菡) and TPP Secretary-General Chou Yu-hsiu (周榆修), all of whom she accused of pushing her out.
She said Huang had been aware of the dual nationality issue and that she did not qualify as a legislator, yet continued to support the legality of her position on the list, raising questions about Huang’s willingness to put rule of law over party politics.
In the same interview, conducted during the ongoing Baishatun (白沙屯) Matsu pilgrimage, Ko addressed the process by which the TPP vetted Li for inclusion on the party’s legislator-at-large list. He said the selection was open to the party as a whole for recommendations, and that the decision was made to have one person representing a Chinese spouse and another to represent a new immigrant, so the list could reflect diverse sections of society.
He then blamed his year-long detention and the mass recall movement for distracting the party from reviewing the system and said there would now be a debate within the party about whether the system should be reviewed.
This follows a familiar Ko playbook: By saying the decision to select Li was made by the party as a whole, he distanced himself from it; by blaming his detention and the recall movement, he suggested the failure to address a flawed internal process was not his responsibility; and by saying a review would follow internal debate, he deferred accountability for ensuring that a review takes place.
In a news conference fielding questions about Li’s criticisms of him, Huang said he was reluctant to spend time discussing someone who is no longer important.
The issues surrounding Li might fade, but the TPP needs to examine its own conduct and flawed processes if it is to survive as a third force in Taiwanese politics.
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