Crossroads Taiwan (Nov. 19, 2023)
The never-ending drama of Taiwan's (maybe) presidential candidates
(We delayed this week’s newsletter to announce the result of the KMT-TPP joint ticket, but oh well)
News Roundup
Hou You-ih, Ko Wen-je agree to joint ticket, only to have Ko renege again
On Saturday, TPP presidential hopeful Ko Wen-je said he was pulling out of a deal that was brokered by former president Ma Ying-jeou on Tuesday, between Ko and KMT presidential hopeful Hou You-ih for a joint presidential ticket.
The opposition candidates have been calling for a consolidation against the DPP’s William Lai, as individually each candidate, all of whom have been hovering around 20-30% in the polls generally, will most likely lose to Lai, who has had 30-40% support. The KMT and the TPP hopes to capture the other 60% of the vote as a consolidated ticket.
However, the consolidation has proved to be difficult. The key question is whether Hou or Ko will be at the top as presidential candidate. Ko and the TPP claim he has had higher polling numbers in general, while Hou and the KMT point to the KMT’s organizational and financial power as one of the two major parties in Taiwan.
While all sides were expecting the result of who would be the presidential candidate in this joint ticket to be announced on Saturday, Ko and his party created the latest twist by stating that there were disagreements between them and the KMT about the margin of error used in a few opinion polls. Due to these unresolvable differences, they failed to determine whether Hou or Ko would be the presidential candidate.
Despite the latest twist, Ko and the KMT both insisted that the deal hadn't fallen apart and they hoped to keep negotiating before the deadline for presidential candidate registration, which is 5 p.m. on November 24.
DPP expects to announce Hsiao Bi-Khim as Lai’s running mate
On the other hand, Taiwan’s Central News Agency and Reuters both reported this week that the ruling party DPP is expected to announce Taiwan Representative to the U.S. Hsiao Bi-Khim as presidential candidate Lai Ching-te’s running mate on November 20.
The news follows months of speculation that the DPP hopes to convince Hsiao to be Lai’s running mate. She is expected to return to Taiwan on November 20 after she finishes work related to APEC in San Francisco. It also comes after Lai repeatedly mentioned Hsiao in recent media interviews.
Commentary
William Yang: A dangerous pattern from Ko begins to form
Just as the whole world was expecting Taiwan’s two main opposition parties, the KMT and TPP, to finally form a joint presidential ticket on Saturday, a new twist emerged from the months-long drama.
The TPP came out to say that they didn’t agree with how the opinion polls, which would determine either Ko or Hou would be the presidential candidate in the joint ticket, were interpreted, causing the deal to reach the brink of collapse.
At the center of the dispute was the margin of error that would be adopted in the opinion polls. The two sides clashed over how to interpret results from two separate opinion polls, one is from the online news organization CNEWS, and the other one is conducted by the TPP internally.
The two sides had different understandings about what margin of error should be applied to the two polls, leading to different outcomes in the comparison of a total of six polls. During the press conference following the news of the near-collapse of their agreement to put forward a joint presidential ticket, Ko insisted that there was still time until next Friday for both sides to try to resolve these differences and maintain the agreement of putting forward one presidential pair.
On the other hand, KMT chairperson Eric Chu also said that the party remains committed to forming a joint presidential ticket with the TPP, but also took the chance to defend the initial results of the comparison, which suggested that the KMT candidate, Hou You-ih, has better results compared to Ko as the presidential election in five of the six opinion polls selected as samples.
The latest twist comes after members of the TPP reportedly expressed their shock at Ko’s decision to agree to the terms of the opinion polls comparison during a meeting between Ko, Chu, Hou, and former KMT chairperson and former Taiwanese president Ma Ying-jeou.
Judging by Ko’s way of handling a potential loss in the bid for the role of presidential candidate in the joint ticket, a potentially dangerous pattern is emerging. Initially, he signed onto the agreement without properly consulting members of his party. Then, when it looked like he wouldn’t be able to secure the spot of the presidential candidate, as well as causing an enormous backslash from his base, he suddenly refused to give his consent to the final result, arguing that the “margin of error” used was unfair to him.
This is not the first time that Ko has suddenly “regretted” an earlier decision that he made during the whole negotiation process between TPP and KMT. On the day that the two parties agreed to join forces, he admitted during a media interview that he felt like he had been “ambushed,” which seemed to suggest that if the final outcome or anything that determined the final outcome doesn’t match with his expectation, there could still be a chance that he wouldn’t stick with the initial agreement.
These precedents show that Ko has a tendency to publicly express opinions that might be viewed as contradicting an initial agreement that he agreed to but may not be favorable to him or his party. Instead of addressing these issues through direct conversation with the KMT, he seems to like to utilize these public comments to gain some leverage through driving relevant public and media discourse.
The constant change of mind is a risky characteristic for a potential Taiwanese leader, because instead of focusing his energy on elaborating on his concrete policy platform, Ko has spent a lot of his energy on political theatrics that might help him gain some leverage in the ongoing negotiation with the KMT.
What needs to be kept in mind is that as Taiwan faces an ever-more-turbulent external environment, with China remaining aggressive in its surrounding region, the nation can’t afford to have a leader whose trademark is to constantly change his mind or stance when the situation gets tough for him.
The heavy emphasis that he puts on political theatrics could turn this potential coalition government into a four-year political drama and battle if they end up winning the presidential election.
And if we look at the entire process of their negotiation, it also shows how fragile the foundation is for this potential coalition government.
While the KMT and TPP try to use the remaining six days to overcome these differences and keep the hope of the joint presidential ticket alive, it’s also important for voters and observers to keep in mind the potential implications that might extend from the signs and trends that certain candidates have been displaying. It could help us to at least have a rough idea about what kind of leader for Taiwan he could be if he were elected president.
Lastly, even though experts and observers have sounded the alarm about the characters and tendencies that Ko has displayed throughout the election campaign, my initial conversation with some of his supporters, especially young people, following the latest twist indicates that they are unlikely to be bothered by the tendency that he has established.
In their view, his blunt reactions and straightforward style of politics show that he is both “genuine and transparent.” Instead of fearing that a leader who constantly changes his position may not be good for Taiwan’s overall interest, they hope an unorthodox leader like Ko could help bring some refreshing energy to Taiwan’s politics.
Chieh-Ting Yeh: Biden-Xi and KMT-TPP summits point to shift in mood
Let me take a break from rambling about history to talk about the two summits in the news this week: the KMT-TPP summit on Tuesday, and then Biden-Xi summit at APEC on Wednesday. Is there any way to think about both of them other than that they coincidentally happened at the same time?
There is a subtle mood shift in the US-Taiwan-China relationship triangle: a pendulum swing towards de-escalation and moderation. These two summits will come to be seen as key moments in this shift.
The Biden-Xi summit is a somewhat change in direction from Xi’s previously confrontational tone. While both sides mostly stuck to their talking points, the tone felt much softer than the rhetoric we have seen from Beijing.
Xi agreed to resume military communication channels as part of the summit. China cut the talks off to retaliate against former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s Taiwan visit last year, which has been read as a sign of increasing tensions. Xi’s backtracking sends the signal that he is still amenable to “managing tensions.”
Xi is dealing with a host of economic pressures and political shakeups at home, while Biden faces an election that is less than a year away. Both sides have an interest in taking a breather from foreign policy for a little while.
From the perspective of the current mood shifts in US-China relations, a “calmer” Taiwan will be welcomed by some policy advisors. Traditionally in Washington, many experts see the DPP as an proactive, if not a provocative, actor in Taiwan-China relations. These people will interpret the KMT-TPP summit as a right step towards creating a more China-friendly administration in Taiwan come January.
The KMT-TPP joint presidential ticket drama is somehow still brewing, even after the two sides agreed to form the joint ticket on Tuesday, only to have Ko Wen-je flip the tables again and walk out. The core difficulty lies in Taiwan’s political culture—a party’s fate is locked in with its presidential candidate. For Hou or Ko, who are each representing his party, being relegated as a running mate could very well mean the demise of his party.
In any case, they are both vying for the anti-DPP vote, and have both claimed they are better suited to dialogue with Beijing. It is also no secret that Beijing prefers either party over the DPP. A KMT-TPP administration, some may believe, will “cool” tensions between Taiwan and China, and buy the US some time.
All of this is predicated on the notion that “tensions” is the most important aspect in evaluating the US-Taiwan-China relationships. Certainly, managing tensions is crucial. If we are entering a new era of big power rivalry in the world, setting down rules and guardrails would go a long way towards a healthy, mutually beneficial competitive relationship.
But reducing tensions in and of itself is not the end goal of any relationship. Reducing tensions for the sake of reducing tensions could lead to sacrificing key interests and values. For Taiwan especially, the question is how to continue to assert Taiwan’s own interests in a measured, but principled, manner.