Taiwan Today

The Kuomintang (KMT) is the only party
in the world to have maintained its ruling status
since World War II. Today, its power is being
challenged as never before. What must it do
to sharpen its competitive edge?

FCR: Why do people support the KMT?

Huang Chu-wen(黃主文): People support the KMT because it follows the Golden Mean. Extremists account for only a small portion of the voters. Although some people are very radical about China's unification or Taiwan independence, most avoid extremes. In last November's election for city mayors and county magistrates, the New Party (NP), which is known for advocating China's unification, only received 1.42 percent of the votes, and the Taiwan Independence Party just 0.19 percent. These results sent a message: most voters are somewhere in the middle of the extremes represented by these parties. People may have a preference for either independence or unification, but they don't want a radical change in the status quo. They want the government to follow a middle-of-the-road policy.

In the past, people supported the KMT because there was no other choice. But the situation has changed since the establishment of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in 1986. Voters have more choices as party politics matures, so it is only normal for a portion of our supporters to turn to other parties.

What is the KMT's mainland policy?

National security is our highest priority in making mainland policy, and this is clearly stated in the government's Guide lines for National Unification. We approach unification in three stages. The short-term phase is for private-sector cross-strait exchanges and reciprocity. The mid-term phase should build mutual trust and cooperation, during which we hope to see the opening up of the three links [direct mail, trade, and investment] and official contacts across the Taiwan Strait. Then, in the long-term phase, a formal consultative organization can be set up to work out a system for unification that meets the will of the people on both sides.

There is no set timetable for each phase--it all depends on the evolving cross-strait environment. Currently, we are still in the first phase of non-governmental exchanges. Considering the limits that Beijing seeks to put on the ROC's diplomatic activity and on the conditions for cross-strait negotiations, it is obvious that we are not being treated with the dignity a sovereign political entity deserves, so we don't think it is time to move to the next phase.

The KMT did poorly in the local elections last November. How can the party sharpen its competitive edge?

The KMT has been the ruling party and has held the majority in the Legislative Yuan and the National Assembly for decades, so the party's policies are actually the government's policies. Therefore, the party takes the blame if the public isn't happy with those policies. For instance, when people complain about public safety, they blame the KMT, saying that it encourages "black-and-gold" [underworld and money] politics. They blame the party for nominating candidates with under world links and for appointing them to public offices. When people are dissatisfied with policies, it becomes a burden for our candidates. It is difficult to win a campaign if you are shouldering a heavy weight while others are not.

Currently, I think the black-and-gold problem is the KMT's most serious weakness, because the party has given people the impression that it is tied closely with the underworld. As the political environment matures, a party can't expect to win elections by buying votes or by nominating underworld figures as candidates. In fact, the government has been undertaking a series of crackdowns on corruption and vote-buying. Moreover, the KMT has been nominating people without a black-and -gold background, and we have been pushing for rapid reform of the judicial system. Nevertheless, we can't blame people for shifting their support to other parties if we are unable to draw a clear line separating the party from the underworld.

Another problem in the KMT is the power struggles between factions, a problem that has existed for a very long time. Oftentimes in public elections, candidates from different KMT factions compete with each other. That's like fighting a civil war, instead of uniting to face the outside competition.

In last November's local elections, several KMT members were not nominated, but they ran for office anyway. This split KMT voters. If the votes for these KMT members are added together, the party actually won more than 48 percent of the total. If same-party candidates had not run against each other, we would have had far different results in those elections. Competition between factions will always exist, but the party needs to keep such competition constructive, and not let it degenerate into mere power struggles.

I think that far-sighted, comprehensive, and workable policies have been our most powerful weapon in party politics. Our economic policy, for example, has made great contributions to the country. Taiwan has been able to maintain an average GNP growth rate of 6 percent [during the last two decades], per capita income has been increasing fast, and the recent financial storm in Asia has hurt Taiwan much less seriously than it has most other countries in the region.

Maybe it's because we don't explain our policies clearly enough to the public, and that's why they think we are often forced to implement things that actually we have been pushing. Take the reelection of the Legislative Yuan and the National Assembly in the early 1990s. The KMT had already planned for that, although there was heavy resistance from long-serving KMT legislators and national assemblymen. But most people don't know that the KMT already had a plan--they think that we didn't want to change at all, and only supported the rejuvenation of those parliamentary bodies because the pressure from the opposition party was so strong.

Reforms are needed, but they can be difficult to achieve. The KMT is the only party in the world to have maintained its ruling status since World War II. This long history certainly gives us much heavier burdens than younger political parties, and these are difficult to jettison. The KMT is like an elephant: it takes a lot of time and effort to turn it around. But this doesn't mean that we shouldn't speed up party reforms. The more democratic we are, the faster our development will be.

                                                                          --interview by Jim Hwang