A two-part TV commercial “foreseeing” a Taipei resident’s “undesirable life” after independent Taipei mayoral candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) is elected has sparked a fusillade of criticism and mockery after it was released by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate Sean Lien’s (連勝文) campaign team, with one academic calling the advertisement the “Lien team’s prescience of its own doom.”
The first part of the commercial, titled Taipei, the day after tomorrow, was released on Tuesday and the second half aired yesterday. It features a young woman in the city who is facing multiple problems concerning public services:
She wants to take a bus, but finds that the line has been discontinued under Ko’s policy of canceling inefficient bus routes. On the news, she sees that Ko has failed to fulfill his public housing promises over a standoff with President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration.
The woman is nearly run over by a group of YouBike users rushing to return the bikes, as a caption underneath says that Ko once said that the public bicycle rental system’s success hinges on Taiwanese’s stinginess.
She also finds it difficult to hail a cab and has to ask her friend to pick her up, all because of Ko’s policies. The woman then goes online and finds discussion threads about Ko saying that he has only now realized that many of his policies had already been implemented by his predecessor, Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), and reads comments from netizens asking whether life would be so bad if Lien had won the race.
Yet all is not lost, as the woman then gets a chance to come back to right before the election and, seizing the moment, throws a wish card reading: “Change, realized” — Ko’s campaign slogan — into a trashcan.
Netizens have picked the ad apart online, with some citing factual errors in the captions and others labeling the commercial “indecent” and saying it verges on blackmail.
Other Internet users have changed the commercial’s captions so that they tout Ko’s successful implementation of policies instead: “Bus system more efficient,” “Unafraid to confront state power” [on public housing], “YouBike system is now everybody’s transportation” and concluding that such changes can be realized.
Some netizens joked that the woman in the ad cannot find a cab because all of them are occupied, which would imply that taxi drivers are doing good business. They added that since the protagonist is using an iPhone 6 and a Macbook, and lives in a posh, spacious apartment equipped with electronic locks and an LCD television, the commercial is actually saying that under Ko’s stewardship, young people in Taipei would be able to afford expensive electronics and good housing.
Others just opted to slam the depiction of a “typical” young woman living in the city as “unrealistic,” with one user saying: “It is surprising that [even though the campaign is nearly over] the people on Lien’s team still have their heads in the clouds [about the reality in Taipei].”
Chen Fang-ming (陳芳明), a Taiwanese literature professor at National Chengchi University, said the commercial has “again revealed [the Lien’s team’s] wickedness, this time via its placing a curse on Taipei residents’ future lives.”
“They [the Lien campaign] lack the ability to positively express and advocate their own views, and can only imagine a deplorable life for Taipei residents [if Ko wins]. This is brazen rumor-mongering and exposes their heart of darkness. This is a serious violation of the spirit of democracy, with absolutely no respect for their opponent,” he said.
Democratic Progressive Party Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday condemned the KMT for employing negative campaign strategies, saying that it is doing so because it has come up against a dead end in its bid to win the Taipei race.
“It is embarrassing for a ruling party to engage in mudsling during the final phase of an election, instead of advertising what it has achieved,” Tsai said.
Meanwhile, Ko’s latest commercial, features several small families going about their usual Sunday activities on the day after the election.
The ad shows them cooking, doing laundry, tidying the house and taking their children out for a walk, saying the families are going about their business as usual, before adding that “a small change to the unchanged life makes us start to anticipate” a better Taipei.
Additional reporting by Loa Iok-sin
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