Independent presidential candidate James Soong (
"I am proud of being a KMT member," Soong said during a TV interview yesterday after learning of his party's decision to expel him and some of his close allies.
"The party machine is controlled by a small group of individuals who distance themselves from the people," he said. "Is the KMT expelling its members? Or is it disconnecting from people?"
Soong was apparently referring to a remark made by President Lee Teng-hui (
"If there is only the party, without due respect to the people's opinion, then the party's existence will be endangered," Soong said.
When asked whether he will now organize his own party, he said: "Up until now I have no plan to do so."
"I joined the party when I was 18 and I love my party," he said. "I've never left my party."
Soong's unwillingness to leave the KMT could be paving the way for him to return to it at some point in the future, analysts said.
"Chiang Kai-shek (
Soong has been campaigning on "non-party politics," which has come under attack from Lee as something that, if realized, would erode the parties' power and in turn destroy the democracy established in Taiwan over the past decade.
While analysts do not believe that such fundamental regression could happen, some of them do think that a president without a party behind him would be weakened considerably.
"We have a semi-presidential Constitution under which, if a president does not enjoy support from more than half of the legislature, he will be virtually reduced to being a figurehead," Lin Jih-wen (
"If Soong is elected and does not want to be a weak president, he had better organize his own party to back him up," Lin said.
Soong, if elected, could succeed to a certain extent by attracting incumbent lawmakers to his camp without organizing a party, but it would not be easy to win over more than half of the legislature, Lin said. "Legislators would need some good excuse to defect," he said.
Su Chih-cheng (
Being kicked out of the party, however, could win Soong some sympathy among voters, analysts said.
"But the effect should be limited, as voters generally have made up their mind and would rarely switch from Lien Chan [
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