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2012 ELECTIONS:
¡¥Anxiety¡¦ affecting elections, US forum told
GREEN FUTURE? Moderator Richard Bush said that
if Tsai won the election, the US would not prejudge her and that any anxieties
that might exist could be calmed
By William Lowther / Staff Reporter in Washington
¡§Looming anxiety¡¨ about the future of cross-strait relations is having a huge
impact on Taiwan¡¦s presidential election campaign, US academic Shelley Rigger
told a Washington conference on Wednesday.
¡§It¡¦s not so much a debate about the details of policy; it¡¦s more a debate about
who can handle this,¡¨ she said. ¡§President Ma Ying-jeou¡¦s (°¨^¤E) policies do
better than the candidate himself. It¡¦s not that people don¡¦t like what he is
doing, it¡¦s that people are not entirely confident in his leadership.¡¨
The conference entitled ¡§Taiwan¡¦s Upcoming Presidential and Legislative
Elections,¡¨ organized by the Brookings Institution, was the latest in a series
of US events reflecting a growing interest in Taiwanese politics driven by
unease over the bigger picture of US-China relations.
Moderator Richard Bush, a senior fellow at Brookings, asked Rigger how the
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) could have come back so strongly after being
¡§consigned to the graveyard¡¨ just three and a half years ago.
¡§One thing that has helped the DPP a lot is disillusionment with Ma,¡¨ Rigger
said. ¡§The expectations that Taiwanese voters had for President Ma were
incredibly high. People were excited and thought that he was going to do great
things. It¡¦s not so much that he hasn¡¦t delivered on his promises; it¡¦s that as
a leader the expectation was that he would be more charismatic and more
inspiring.¡¨
Instead, she said, he had been inward looking and aloof.
At the same time, Rigger said, the DPP had benefited from the perception that in
a democracy there is a need for a multi-party environment.
However, while the DPP has revived remarkably well, its success is problematic,
she said.
¡§I don¡¦t think the DPP has really dealt with the problems that caused its
downfall in 2008. The recovery has been too quick and the same people are back
again, and that makes Beijing very uncomfortable,¡¨ she said.
Hsu Szu-chien (®}´µ»ü), an assistant research fellow at the Institute of Political
Science at Academia Sinica in Taipei, said he had heard that there was some deep
dissatisfaction with Ma in Beijing.
He said Ma had not been doing what hardliners in Beijing expected politically
and that Ma had not given as much as he received.
Hsu said that if Ma is re-elected, the pressure on him from Beijing might
increase.
Rigger said she was in Shanghai last weekend meeting academics and officials,
and their message was crystal clear: ¡§They do not want to see Tsai elected.¡¨
¡§The focus of their anxiety is her unwillingness to endorse the [so-called]
¡¥1992 consensus.¡¦ That is going to be a real sticking point if she wins,¡¨ Rigger
said. ¡§They are going to put pressure on the US to keep this situation under
control if she wins and they were very explicit in threatening various kinds of
repercussions for Taiwan.¡¨
Among the likely repercussions are that direct quasi-official talks on
cross-strait affairs could end; ¡§economic assistance¡¨ ¡X ostensibly from China to
Taiwan ¡X would be hard to continue; agreements already signed might not be
implemented, including the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA); and
the international space that Taiwan has been given could be pulled back.
¡§What the US government genuinely desires is another free and fair election,¡¨
Rigger said.
However, it is also true that the last three years of ¡§peace¡¨ in the Taiwan
Strait had provided the US with the opportunity to focus its attention on other
pressing issues.
If Tsai is elected, Rigger added, there is a possibility that the People¡¦s
Republic of China would no longer continue that pattern and that ¡§would be
unfortunate from the US point of view.¡¨
Bush said that if Tsai won the election, the US would not prejudge her and that
any anxieties that might exist could be calmed, based on her performance.
¡§We would want to see what she did, rather than making a judgement in advance,¡¨
he said.
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