The revelation that former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator Chang Hsien-yao (張顯耀) in September 2023 met with Wang Huning (王滬寧), now Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference chairman, to confirm Beijing’s support for the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) candidate for president, Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), should have been a big story. But when it dropped last month it was quickly overwhelmed by other breaking news.
In the March 12 “ Donovan’s Deep Dives,” we explored the details of what is publicly known about a text message between Ko and Chang, who is also the former Mainland Affairs Council deputy minister and deputy director of the KMT’s Central Policy Committee.
AN IMPORTANT DISTINCTION
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
There are still many questions that may come out in Chang’s trial for allegedly contravening the Anti-Infiltration Act (反滲透法) and the Presidential and Vice Presidential Election and Recall Act (總統副總統選舉罷免法).
Following Mirror Media’s initial report, and the announcement by prosecutors of the detention of Chang that confirmed the reporting, most media outlets summarized both, but did not follow up.
Mirror Media quoted a former Ko staffer that, following the 2015 Twin Cities forum in Shanghai, Ko reached out to gain a connection to China’s leader Xi Jinping (習近平) and consulted with a business person with ties there who was willing to help.
Assuming this reporting is correct, Ko was looking for an intermediary, and E-United Group founder Lin Yi-shou (林義守) was a good candidate. Chang was allegedly acting on behalf of Lin in the social media messages, later ordered by Ko to be deleted but discovered by prosecutors. But there is so far no publicly known proof Ko reached out to Lin first.
This distinction is important. If Ko arranged this via Lin, then Lin could also face charges alongside Chang for colluding with Beijing to arrange their interference in last year’s presidential election.
Either way, why was this organized in the first place?
WINNING ELECTORAL POWER
It was not to arrange some sort of peace deal with Beijing. Ko could have done that publicly and would not have been so nervous about deleting messages describing Chang’s summation of the trip and using an intermediary between himself and Chang.
The message was about the election, so that was the motivation, regardless of whether it was Ko or Lin who orchestrated it.
While Beijing’s influence is not all-powerful, it helps move the needle. If the NT$100 million mentioned in the message did indeed refer to the Chinese helping to raise it, that is important.
They would not transfer it directly, but get Taiwanese with extensive business interests in China to donate it inside Taiwan, then reward their Chinese subsidiaries with lucrative deals in China.
It was mentioned in the message that Lin wanted approval to back Ko, and he would be a prime candidate for this type of scenario via his extensive business holdings in China.
Chinese propaganda also pulls some weight in some communities in Taiwan, which can motivate voter decisions and turnout.
This might only be worth thousands or tens of thousands of votes, but that helps in a close race. Those votes also translate into government-funded election subsidies.
CONSPIRING AGAINST THE KMT
Why was Chang, a high-ranking KMT party official, conspiring against his own party’s presidential candidate to help Ko?
Though many in his party of a similar background of being descendants of those who fled the Chinese Civil War were openly worrying about the KMT’s presidential candidate, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-ih (侯友宜), following in the footsteps of former KMT president and fellow native Taiwanese Hoklo speaker Lee Tung-hui (李登輝), it would be odd for Chang to transfer his loyalty to Ko, who is also a native Taiwanese Hoklo speaker.
Personal gain was clearly a motivation. In the message, Chang stated that he hoped to get a party list legislative seat as a reward. He must have been disappointed not to get one, especially if he did in the end help raise NT$100 million.
Choosing Chang would have looked bad politically for the TPP due to Chang’s closeness to Beijing and previous allegations of sharing secret and confidential documents with the Chinese that cost him his job as Mainland Affairs Council deputy minister.
WHY KO?
Why did Zhongnanhai look favorably on Ko’s candidacy and not Hou’s?
Even if Hou is more like Lee than all of the former’s public pronouncements let on, the KMT can and would constrain him in a way that was harder to do in the Lee era. Back then the party was reliably anti-Communist and many in the party were pro-localization.
It is different today, many of the pro-localization KMT politicians left to form the Taiwan Solidarity Union, others were purged and what remains now has strong ties to China. For an in-depth look at today’s KMT from this angle, be sure to read Michael Turton’s insightful piece in the Dec. 16 “Notes from Central Taiwan: So what if the KMT Taiwanizes.”
If they did favor Ko, is it because they have compromising material on him? There have been reports that Ko helped the Chinese with organ harvesting when he worked there. It would also not be surprising if Ko had been treated to some hospitality in the early aughts when he was there, hospitality that often included drunken banquets and visits to prostitutes.
It is possible they have this type of kompromat, but I do not think that is what is going on in this case. If they had that, they would have reached out to him, not the other way around.
I think the highest probability is that the CCP does not fully trust the KMT and calculated that the presence of Ko and the TPP is more destabilizing to Taiwan’s democracy than it would be otherwise.
That is in the CCP’s interests.
Donovan’s Deep Dives is a regular column by Courtney Donovan Smith (石東文) who writes in-depth analysis on everything about Taiwan’s political scene and geopolitics. Donovan is also the central Taiwan correspondent at ICRT FM100 Radio News, co-publisher of Compass Magazine, co-founder Taiwan Report (report.tw) and former chair of the Taichung American Chamber of Commerce. Follow him on X: @donovan_smith.
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