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Explainer | Who is running in Taiwan’s presidential election and what does it mean for mainland China?
- Three parties have candidates looking to take over the island’s top job from incumbent Tsai Ing-wen
- Each party relies on different wells of support in the community and has its own outlook on relations with the mainland
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More than 19 million Taiwanese voters will go to the presidential polls on January 13 in an election that is expected to shape cross-strait relations as well as US-China relations.
Eight years after Tsai Ing-wen of the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was first elected president, the stakes are particularly high.
Beijing has stepped up military, political and economic pressure on the self-ruled island in the past year and warned there is a risk of war if the DPP stays in power.
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It sees both the DPP’s candidate, Vice-President William Lai Ching-te, the front runner in the presidential race, and his running mate Hsiao Bi-Khim, as dangerous “separatists” and “troublemakers”.
Taiwan is also the “most dangerous” issue in China’s relationship with the United States, Chinese President Xi Jinping told his US counterpart Joe Biden in November.
Who are the candidates in the presidential election?
The three presidential candidates are the DPP’s Lai, Hou Yu-ih from the Kuomintang (KMT) and Ko Wen-je from the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP).
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