Tainan, Taiwan
DailyExpertNews
—
Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen has resigned as leader of the island’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party after her party suffered heavy losses in midterm elections.
The DPP’s losses in Saturday’s vote come as a severe blow to Tsai, as she had tried to frame the election — technically a local affair to elect mayors, councilors and county heads — as a way to send a signal against Beijing’s increasing warmongering towards the island. .
Beijing has become increasingly assertive in its territorial claims over Taiwan in recent months, launching large-scale military exercises around the island in August in response to a controversial visit by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
But Tsai’s call to connect the issues seems to have contributed little to the success of her party, which is often outperformed by the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) party in local votes.
According to Taiwan’s official Central News Agency, the KMT — widely seen as more friendly to Beijing and in favor of closer economic ties with mainland China — is expected to win mayoral elections in 13 provinces. By comparison, Tsai’s party is expected to win only five, one less than in the last local election.
“We humbly accept the results of the election and the decision of the people of Taiwan,” Tsai wrote on Facebook Saturday night.
She added that she had already resigned as party chief to “take full responsibility”.
Tsai, however, remains on as president. Her presidential term ends in 2024.
The result comes despite escalating rhetoric from Beijing. Chinese leader Xi Jinping told a Communist Party meeting last month that “the wheels of history are rolling on the road to the reunification of China” and that Beijing would never refrain from using force to take Taiwan.
Analysts said the result showed voters were more focused on domestic issues such as the economy and social security.
“Taiwanese voters have become desensitized to China’s military threat. And that’s why there’s not much urgency to focus on the issue of survival,” said Wen-ti Sung, a political scientist at Australia National University’s Taiwan Studies Program.
“The DPP’s China Threat Map Faces Diminishing Marginal Revenues Over Time.”
That assessment echoed the thoughts of voter Liao Su-han, an art curator from central Nantou province who cast a vote for the DPP, but said Beijing’s recent actions were not a major factor in determining her vote.
“The military threat from China has always been there and it didn’t just start this year,” she said.
“As Taiwanese, we are quite used to China’s rhetoric that they want to invade us all the time, so [it] had no major influence on who I vote.”
Eric Su, a 30-year-old account executive who lives in New Taipei City, said that while he voted for Tsai in the presidential election, he supported a KMT candidate because they are stronger on local issues.
“In presidential elections, I think more about global issues because a president can influence our economy and international status,” he said.
“In a mayoral election, I care more about what a candidate can do for local residents, such as infrastructure planning and child subsidies.”
The KMT, also known as the Chinese Nationalist Party, ruled China between 1912 and 1949, when it retreated to Taiwan after losing a civil war to the Chinese Communist Party.
The KMT established its own government on the island – taking control of the island from Japan after World War II – while the Communist Party took control of mainland China. Since then, the Communist Party has cherished the ambition of ‘reunification’ with Taiwan – by force if necessary.
When the KMT first fled to Taiwan, then-President Chiang Kai-shek ruled the island with an iron fist, enacting decades of martial law to quell political dissent.
After decades of struggle by pro-democracy campaigners, Taiwan gradually transitioned from authoritarian rule to democracy, holding its first direct presidential elections in 1996.
The KMT is now widely seen as more friendly to Beijing than the ruling DPP, accepting a so-called “1992 Consensus”, a tacit agreement that both Taipei and Beijing recognize they belong to “one China”, but with differing interpretations of what that means means.
Tsai, on the other hand, has refused to acknowledge the consensus. Her DPP’s position is to defend Taiwan’s status quo as an independent government and expand its international space against an increasingly assertive Beijing.
One of the more notable victories in Friday’s mayoral races was that of Chiang Wan-an, the great-grandson of Chiang Kai-shek. He will become the next mayor of Taipei after defeating DPP’s Chen Shih-chung, who served as Taiwan’s health minister during the Covid-19 pandemic.
In a statement on Saturday night, China’s Taiwan Affairs Office said the election results showed that most people in Taiwan value “peace, stability and a good life”. It said Beijing “will continue to vigorously oppose Taiwan’s independence and foreign interference”.
However, experts said the KMT’s victory did not necessarily reflect a shift in how the Taiwanese public viewed their relationship with mainland China.
“The election was voted on bread-and-butter issues, and I disagree that it has a major impact on Taiwan’s policy on the Taiwan Strait,” said J. Michael Cole, a Taipei-based senior adviser of the International Republican Institute.
“The outcome of this election does not reflect what voters are looking for when choosing the next president.”
Sung at Australia National University said it was too early to speculate on the KMT’s chances of winning the next presidential election in 2024, but felt this result had given it a boost.
“The KMT is now better positioned to be the (party) uniting the opposition and attracting all the anti-status quo protest voices against the current government,” he said.
