TAICHUNG (Taiwan News) — Tensions have been very high in the Kuomintang (KMT) this year, and cracks have become visible, especially between supporters of the officially nominated presidential candidate, New Taipei Mayor Hou Yu-ih (侯友宜), and supporters of Foxconn founder Terry Gou (郭台銘), who are angry at party Chair Eric Chu (朱立倫) for foregoing a primary and directly selecting Hou.
However, there may be something deeper going on in the KMT that could shake up the party significantly. The party has undergone two major shakeups during the democratic era, with the first being the introduction of direct elections for lawmakers in the early 1990s, and the phasing out of the one-party state.
At the time, a chunk of the KMT broke away to form the New Party (NP), which was seen as a cleaner, less corrupt, and more ideologically fresh version of the KMT. They did well initially, but infighting and a sharp turn towards China eventually marginalized the party.
The second shakeup came with the loss of the presidency for the first time in the 2000 election. Two parties broke away from the KMT, the People’s First Party (PFP) and the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU).
Like the NP before them, they both became significant players in the legislature, before fading into irrelevance. Incidentally, of the three, the PFP rose to become the most prominent, but today the TSU is the most successful, holding three local councilor seats as opposed to two for the PFP and only one remaining seat for the NP.
What followed was a long period of relative stability in the KMT, especially after around 2005. Some of the NP and PFP defectors were welcomed back into the party, others were not.
Local patronage factions
On Tuesday morning (August 22), former Miaoli County Commissioner Hsu Yao-chang (徐耀昌) announced on Facebook he was quitting the KMT. He is the third known supporter of Gou to do so, following in the footsteps of the Nantou County Council speaker and the Changhua County Council speaker.
There are several other county council speakers and, importantly, the powerful former Yunlin County Commissioner Chang Jung-wei (張榮味), who all attended a banquet for Gou held by Chang. They are still KMT members, but some are predicting a domino effect with more following suit and quitting the party.
It is still too early to say that is the case, but it is possible. These speakers and former county commissioners are local political powerhouses.
Many are associated with KMT local patronage factions dominated by Hoklo Taiwanese-speaking political clans, with the Yunlin Chang family being one of the most prominent. We examined the role of the factions in a previous column, but in a nutshell, they are vote-getting machines that have their fingers in a lot of pies, not always entirely legally, including Chang, who has served time for corruption.
The local factions operate very differently, with a separate mentality from KMT party central, which traditionally has been dominated by elite families of 49ers who fled the Chinese Civil War. It is that inherent tension that may be coming to the fore, and support for Gou and anger at Eric Chu's decision to not hold a primary are just the symptoms, not the cause.
What does the KMT still have to offer?
As we explored in a recent column, the KMT is not only broke and surviving on ever-expanding debt, it is teetering on the edge of financial collapse. Aside from the brand name, what leverage does the KMT still have over the local factional politicians?
It is beginning to look like they are starting to ask themselves that very question. The KMT’s financial difficulties started in 2017, but these politicians have been raised in the KMT, and for the last six years probably assumed that the party would right itself, win back power, and sort out its finances.
Those things have not happened. The KMT has lost both the executive and legislative branches in two back-to-back national landslides, and it is looking grim for the party again this election cycle.
The key leverage points that KMT party central could offer were money and access to power, both of which it no longer has. Yet, the party has been dictating terms as they had in the past, skipping primaries to choose candidates by fiat in both this presidential race and all but one of the city and county executive races held last year, which ruffled a lot of feathers.
Normally, primaries are held by opinion polling, with the most popular candidate representing the party. Unsurprisingly, many potential candidates, especially the ones who thought they would win, were infuriated at not having even the chance to compete.
That is not the core source of the tension, but it may be the turning point where many of these factional politicians began to question their relationship with the party more broadly.
These local politicians control their own get-out-the-vote operations, have their own fundraising mechanisms, and operate their own local networks. How is party central helping?
How big of a problem this is for the KMT and how many might leave the party going forward is an open question, and it might play out over a short period of time or a longer period of time. However, according to signs, it is clear that something is playing out.
Hsu sheds light
It is in this context that some of the comments that have been made by former Miaoli County Commissioner Hsu are illuminating. Though I can not verify it, Hsu says he is speaking aloud what a lot of others are thinking, and others have indeed been saying similar things in less blunt forms.
Hsu initially made headlines in early August, while still in the KMT, at a “mainstream public opinion” rally held by Terry Gou. Gou rallied the crowd to “take down” the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
However, when Hsu took the microphone, he declared, “We not only want the DPP to step down, we also want to take down the KMT so the KMT can thoroughly reflect on itself.” He later claimed he misspoke, but watching the video, it was pretty obvious he had not.
He now says those words were “meaningful and heartfelt.” While he expressed sadness at leaving the party, he went on to add some serious criticism of Hou and the KMT.
He made four criticisms of Hou, which in essence boiled down to accusing him of being selfish and not a team player. He also contrasted the DPP supporting their candidate, Vice President Lai Ching-te (賴清德), “from start to finish" and said the pan-blue camp “is really a joke.”
He said of the KMT, “Do not keep thinking you’re still an infallible, magnificent great party,” and pointed out that the party had “no money, no influence, and no ruling power.” Consider those comments in the context outlined above.
The day after Hsu’s resignation, KMT Kinmen County Council Speaker Hung Yun-tien (洪允典) met Terry Gou at the airport and spent much of the day with him, but he did not meet with Hou, who was also in Kinmen at the time. Hung was asked if he also planned to quit the KMT, to which he replied, “Right now, I’m still not considering it myself.”
When asked if he was worried about the party disciplining him for so openly backing Gou and snubbing Hou, Hung replied, “There is no worse to come with the KMT, it is already falling apart now.”
