Decline and fall of Taiwan’s KMT a sobering lesson for Hong Kong politicians
Alice Wu says frequent infighting and a lack of unity can only alienate voters, as the Kuomintang discovered in the presidential election
When a political party has the luxury to operate with complacency and with plenty of time for nasty infighting, it loses the people. That, in a nutshell, is what happened to the Kuomintang in Taiwan; it was unable to pull itself together for the people it should serve.
No party is free from infighting, but the KMT managed to put it on public display, in the ugliest ways. The feud between then president Ma Ying-jeou and legislative speaker Wang Jin-pyng simply went on for too long, and the issues were never resolved.
After its crushing defeat – not last week, but in 2014, when the Democratic Progressive Party made headway in local elections – there was much talk but very little action.
While its main rival, the DPP gained momentum, the timid factions of a KMT in complete disarray looked on with their arms folded.
If how the KMT ended up with Hung as its candidate is considered evidence of how bad things were, then replacing her at the 11th hour with Eric Chu Li-luan was the final nail in the party’s coffin.