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Group changes tactics and cuts ties with DPP
The Taiwan Solidarity Union has decided to officially sever its link with the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party and take a more moderate stance in the hope of becoming a third force on the island.
Chairman Huang Kun-huei yesterday announced the reorganisation of the party, which was set up in 2001 with the help of former president Lee Teng-hui.
Its mission had been to co-operate with the DPP in promoting the island's identity as a self-ruling entity with the ultimate goal of building a 'Taiwan nation'.
Under the new plan, the TSU would not only cease to be the DPP's ally and become its competitor, it  would  also ditch its hard-core pro-independence position in favour of a more moderate stand.
'Following the legislative and presidential elections, the TSU is fully aware of the decision of the public and their desire for a new political era,' Mr Huang said.
'It is a brand new era, when ethnic divide and ideological confrontation over [Taiwanese] independence and [cross-strait] unification must be abandoned.'
Mr Lee, considered the spiritual leader of the TSU, also said the party must change its tactics if it was to remain  a political force in Taiwan.
'In the latest political development in Taiwan, there is a need to have an idealistic, clean, reformative and rational opposition party that places emphasis on Taiwan and represents the voices of the grass-roots people,' he said.
He said the TSU must seek to compete with both the DPP and the Kuomintang, which will become the governing party after Ma Ying-jeou  becomes the president on May 20.
'But such a competition should no longer be a battle of ideological differences. Rather, it is a battle of policies over whether they are beneficial to Taiwanese people,' Mr Lee said.
Voters chose Mr Ma's KMT, which advocates eventual cross-strait unification  while retaining Taiwan's democracy, even though Mr Ma's DPP opponent in the March 22 election, Frank Hsieh Chang-ting,  had strongly suggested the KMT politician would sell out Taiwan to the mainland if elected.
Mr Lee said Taiwanese were already democratic enough not to be fooled by ideological gimmicks and  had been able to make their decisions based on  the performance of the DPP government.
Mr Huang said the TSU would  soon dissolve its  decision-making central standing committee to pave the way for reorganisation and re-registration of party memberships.
'We will fully transform into a new party to engage in rational dialogue with other parties,' he said.
But he stressed the TSU would still consider Taiwanese identity as the party's core value because that  was vital to Taiwan.
He said there was no need for the TSU to seek to declare Taiwanese independence as the island was already a sovereign, independent entity.
Mr Lee warned the incoming KMT government against  placing all its hopes on the mainland revitalising  the island's economy, saying it would be 'too naive to think that when the Chinese investments come, Taiwan's economy will turn better'.



Taiwanese party seeks to become third force