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EDITORIAL: Ma needs
to bridge political divide
There is nothing unusual about a governing party and the opposition having their
differences. This is no excuse, however, for them refusing to meet and sort out
these differences. On Thursday, Minister of the Interior Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源) met
representatives from environmental groups in what was an example of how this
should be done.
There had initially been some tension between the two sides, as Lee had
criticized environmental groups for not supporting the government’s fuel and
electricity price increase policy. The groups replied, through the media, that
Lee had got his wires crossed and Lee then invited them to a meeting. To all
appearances, it had all the makings of being quite a fraught occasion.
As it turned out, despite the differences of opinion, the atmosphere at the
debate was affable. The groups kept to their positions that the price increases
had little to do with energy conservation or environmental protection and simply
reflected the losses accrued by CPC Corp, Taiwan and Taiwan Power Co (Taipower).
As a result, they said, there was no reason to support the policy.
Lee conceded their basic point. In the end, Green Consumers’ Foundation chairman
Jay Fang (方儉) suggested that if Lee were to show a commitment to carbon
disclosure over the next year, the environmental groups would be more than
willing to help out. Lee promised to cooperate. From what could have been a
tense meeting, the two sides succeeded in communicating meaningfully with each
other and in generating a constructive plan of action. It was a real
swords-to-plowshares moment.
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) has done quite well in this regard in his relations
with Beijing, but relations between domestic political parties are pretty
frosty, and have been for some time. For four years now, Ma has been talking of
meeting with opposition leaders. While it was no surprise that he had little to
do with former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairperson Tsai Ing-wen
(蔡英文), he did not have much to do with the pan-blue People First Party either.
He recently broached the subject again, but nothing came of it and DPP Chairman
Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) accused him of playing politics.
There are several reasons for the breakdown in communication between the
governing and opposition parties. First of all, Ma is too interested in
appearances. He wants any meeting with opposition leaders to be held in a public
forum, TV cameras present, with himself in the capacity of president, with the
stated aim of reaching a consensus — like some kind of formal meeting between
two national leaders. This poses too many complications, with too many factors
that can go wrong.
Second, politics is always going to get in the way. There is little love lost
between the government and opposition and each side will approach any meeting
intent on political point-scoring. There is just too little room for agreement
or concession.
Third, it is far from clear that Ma will be going into any meeting with a
genuine desire for communication. As president and chairman of the governing
party, he holds all the cards and he is not going to want to compromise or
concede anything to the opposition. He lacks the mentality to see the benefit of
communication taking place at all. It is no surprise, then, that talks on
holding a meeting never go beyond the preliminary stages between intermediaries.
Ma admitted during a recent press conference that the government could be doing
much better on the communication side of things, and yet he has done nothing to
change the way he communicates with the legislature or the opposition.
As the president of a democratic country, this certainly is his biggest flaw. If
Ma really wants to improve this, it is really quite simple: All he needs to do
is pick up the phone and call Su and ask him how he is doing. Then things might
change.
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