Two months before the presidential election on January 13, 2024, the Taiwanese electoral campaign, until now rather dull, has suddenly become hectic. While details of an unexpected alliance between two opposition parties, the Kuomintang (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), both in favor of economic rapprochement with China, were to be announced on Saturday morning, this are separate press conferences which took place successively to finally explain the reasons for this non-alliance, while specifying that the engagement was not completely broken…
In short, the two parties could not agree on who deserved the top spot – the position of president – and who should accept the second role, vice president. The distribution was supposed to be decided on the basis of the polls of the last eleven days. But the criteria imposed by the KMT were ultimately deemed unacceptable by the TPP.
Until the announcement of this coalition on November 15, Voting intentions were distributed between four candidates, three neck and neck and one trailing behind. Victory then seemed almost assured for the green camp, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), in power since 2016 under the presidency of Tsai Ing-wen and slightly in the lead. Even if it remains qualified as an independentist-separatist by Beijing which refuses to dialogue with its representatives, the DPP now advocates the status quo in relations with China, and no longer independence, the objective of which however remains part of his manifesto.
Spontaneity and outspokenness
But the head of the DPP list, Lai Ching-te, 64, a trained doctor and vice-president of the country, has neither the stature nor the experience of the outgoing president. He also suffers from the weariness of his fellow citizens in the face of a worn-out party which has disappointed domestically. His popularity rating in the polls has thus fallen below 30%. Therefore, the announcement of an agreement between the two candidates who were hot on his heels with respectively 25% and 21% of the voting intentions seemed to dash the DPP’s hopes of victory in the next presidential election.
The fact remains that his two rivals, Ko Wen-je and Hou Yu-ih, ultimately failed to reach an agreement, at least not within the announced deadline. In the Taiwanese political landscape, Ko Wen-je is the rising star, the candidate who arouses the most enthusiasm among his supporters. He currently occupies second place in the polls, at the head of the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) which he founded in 2019. At 64, the former mayor of Taipei, also a doctor by training, nicknamed Ke-P, is sometimes compared to former American President Donald Trump for his harsh, sometimes macho or contemptuous remarks, his very high opinion of himself and his totally unpredictable character. But it is precisely his spontaneity and outspokenness that appeals, particularly to young people.
You have 55% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.