Taiwan's Lai Ching-te era has begun.

On Jan 13, 2024, he was elected the 16th President of Taiwan, Republic of China (ROC), winning 5.57 million votes in a three-way presidential election, making it the first time for one party to win for more than two consecutive terms.

However, Lai received only 40% of the votes, slightly higher than Chen Shui-bian in 2000, making him only the second president in Taiwan’s history to fail to win over half of the votes. Coupled with the fact that the DPP has lost the majority of the parliamentary seats, the next four years are bound to be very difficult for him.

Compared to Tsai Ing-wen, who won an unprecedented 8.17 million votes four years ago, Lai’s victory was narrow. The key lies in the fact that the mantra of "resisting China and protecting Taiwan", which was the deciding factor in the last presidential election, has failed to make a strong impact this year.

During his election campaign, Lai emphasized that China is the biggest threat to Taiwan's survival, and criticized his opponents for accepting the “1992 Consensus”, which means accepting the "one China" principle and the "one country, two systems" premise. Instead, he will abide by Tsai Ing-wen's "Four Insistences", and will stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the liberal and democratic camps to safeguard the country's national security. Similar rhetoric has failed to touch the majority of the people.

Absense of strong external China factors

"The year 2020 was special, because a foreign factor (Hong Kong's anti-China movement) has inspired the Taiwanese people to support the values of freedom and democracy, and projected them onto Tsai," said Hsiao Yi-ching, a researcher at the Election Research Center of National Chengchi University, adding that voters who cast their ballots for Tsai four years ago, under a strong sense of crisis, could not be construed as supporters of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). It is not surprising that Lai could not replicate that win in this year's election.

With the absence of external incidents, internal problems have returned to the center.

However, Lai, who continues Tsai's line, can only play defense in the face of the opposition party's fierce attacks on the various deficiencies in governance and its demand for party change, making it difficult for him to take the initiative to attack.

"A political party that has been in power for eight years can't avoid offending voters. Anyone who is unhappy will point their finger at the government, and that's our disadvantage," a DPP staff member said.

Moreover, not everyone thinks that the DPP has been doing a good job.

Taiwan Public Opinion Foundation (TPOF) Chairman Michael You (游盈隆) analyzed that the Tsai Ing-wen administration has made considerable achievements, but it has also caused a lot of public discontent, otherwise the DPP would not have suffered two crushing defeats in the nine-in-one elections, "and all these burdens have to be borne by Lai Ching-te in a generalized way," he said.

Although nearly 60% of the voters are not happy to see the DPP continue to be in power, the opposition KMT has failed to meet the public's expectations, with Hou Yu-ih receiving only 33% of the vote.

Although Taiwan voters have already rejected the pro-China line in the 2020 presidential election, the KMT is still unable to break away from the established framework. In addition to Hou's acceptance of the 1992 Consensus, which is in line with the Constitution of the ROC, former President Ma Ying-jeou's statement that "we must trust Xi Jinping" on the eve of the polling day dealt a severe blow to HOU's election campaign.

You analyzed that the issue of "war and peace" did not take center stage because this year's election lacked a strong Chinese factor, and in the past eight years, Taiwan society has been quite reassured of the Tsai government's cross-strait foreign policy, and the DPP has incurred public grievances mostly over internal affairs issues.

KMT: clinging to old ideas

Hou Yu-Ih's pre-election campaign has failed to realize its effectiveness. (Photo: Ming-tang Huang)

However, in terms of economic development, the KMT still holds onto opening cross-strait dialogues to resolve ECFA disputes, negotiating cross-strait trade in goods and services, and participating in regional economic integration. "These were all old ideas from before 2008, which are no longer applicable in the new phase of the U.S.-China competition of 2024," said Albert Chiu (邱師儀), a professor of political science at Tunghai University, who said that the KMT's outdated arguments can only consolidate the base but cannot spread.

Towards the end of the campaign, the KMT's call for strategic voting has had limited effect. "This means that many voters do not see defeating the DPP as a priority, but rather they want to see real change, and therefore prefer to vote for Ko Wen-je, who has a lower chance of winning, rather than supporting the old-school KMT," Chiu said.

Voters who are dissatisfied with the DPP's rule but are not happy to see the KMT "go back to the old ways" have made Ko, chairman of the People's Party of Taiwan (PPT), the biggest dark horse.

After the collapse of the "blue-white coalition", Ko's polls once plummeted, but at the end of the election campaign, his popularity has rapidly risen. In the last week before the polls, he held photo booths all over the country, attracting thousands of people to line up, and the enthusiasm of his supporters was much higher than that of his two rivals.

Ko Wen-je and the Taiwan People's Party will continue their influence in political realm in the next four years. (Photo: Pei-Yin Hsieh)

At the Yilan photo booth, Mr. Lin, the first person in line, stayed up all night after his night shift and arrived in Yilan at 9:00 a.m., waiting for two hours in the cold wind. The 38-year-old Lin, who works in the service industry, supported Ko for one simple reason: "My life has not changed for the better in the past eight years, and I don't believe that the Kuomintang will be able to do a good job. Only Ko has given me hope.

Ko has given voters hope by advocating "winning back this country together" and taking a middle-of-the-road approach to cross-strait relations, and has won more than 26 percent of the vote, a record high for a third force in a presidential election.

"A new social force has emerged in Taiwan, represented by Ko, that opposes the established power of the two major parties," Yau analyzed.

Four years of more checks and balances for Lai

Taiwan's political scene will be filled with more variables.

In his victory press conference, Lai pointed out that he fully recognizes that the people are looking forward to a "capable government" and "efficient checks and balances", and he promised that in the future, he will not discriminate between parties, and that he will employ people based on merit, and that he will put aside disputes and continue to communicate in the future, and that he will lead Taiwan towards a politics of "communication, consultation, participation, and cooperation".

Hsiao predicts that in the future presidential election, without China's intervention, the benefits of "resisting China and protecting Taiwan" will continue to diminish, and that the DPP must do more in domestic affairs if it wants to stay in power.

However, Lai's future administration is bound to be subject to a high degree of checks and balances by the opposition parties, and the efficiency of the executive and legislative operations will not be as smooth as in the past 8 years. In order to promote his administration, he may prioritize cooperation with the People's Party, which has a more moderate cross-strait stance.

Whether President Lai can find a solution to break through this difficult situation will determine the future fate of Taiwan.

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Have you read?

• William Lai: Not just “Tsai Ing-Wen 2.0”
• Walking a tightrope on Taiwan-U.S. relations: Interview with Hsiao Bi-khim

Uploaded by Ian Huang