Taiwan elections to have profound geo-political impact

On the eve of presidential elections in self-ruled Taiwan, frontrunner Tsai Ing-wen adopted a conciliatory tone saying she would pursue peaceful relations with China if she wins Saturday’s ballot.

“That ambiguity (surrounding the 1992 consensus) is actually a smartly orchestrated strategy to pacify the party’s pro-independence fundamentalists while leaving Tsai room to manoeuvre in her dealings with China”, Wang said.

Accordingly, relations have improved as they launched direct flights and have set up closer trade links.

But voters feel the economic benefits have not trickled down to ordinary people and Ma has been accused of lacking transparency in his dealings with Beijing.

“During the past years under the Ma Ying-jeou administration, Taiwan’s economy didn’t get better but deteriorated instead”.

Barring a monumental upset, Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) leader Tsai Ing-wen is poised to become Taiwan’s first woman President, while DPP could also win a majority in Parliament in the concurrent legislative elections to deal KMT a double blow.

In the presidential race, Chu now lags behind Tsai in most polls by a substantial margin, partly as a result of the party’s late-stage switching of candidates, but also due to voter concerns about the Nationalists China-friendly policies.

According to former 1989 student leader Wang Dan, who fled China after the 1989 pro-democracy movement on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, Taiwan’s democracy is now entering a new phase of pressure groups and grass-roots activism.

Tsai may be viewed as toxic by Beijing – “she has done nothing but embarrass herself”, says China’s media – but she is not expected to aggressively rile China.

“The DPP has run a good campaign … projecting a positive image, and focusing public attention on the KMT’s record”, said Dr Richard C Bush, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and former head of American Institute in Taiwan, the de facto United States Embassy.

Tsai Ing-wen had guaranteed not to behave as a trouble maker as Chen Shui-bian had done.

But, she believed that cross-strait ties would remain stable as “everything can be discussed and negotiated”. In 2000, the parties’ rotations had caused ups and downs of cross-straits relations.

But Tsai and her independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) are looked at with great suspicion by China, which considers Taiwan a rebel province to be brought under its control, by force if necessary.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) shares gained 4.18 percent, their biggest single-day gain since September 9 a year ago, to close at NT$137, while Largan Precision Co (大立光), a smartphone camera lens supplier to Apple Inc, added 8.89 percent to close at NT$2,020.

Analysts say Tsai is a far stronger candidate this time around, partly because an earlier generation of DPP politicians have left the stage and are no longer competing for attention and influence. The support rate for KMT Chu is on the rise.

In 2012, Taiwan had about 6 million voters abstaining from elections, which had accounted for almost a third of all voters. Largely ignored by the American media, Taiwan’s election on January 16 has been easy to miss in the West.

Tung Chen-yuan, professor of Graduate Institute of Development Studies at National Chengchi University, said it would be impossible for Tsai to adopt a cross-strait policy that would provoke China, given her preference of resolving all problems in a rational manner.

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