Taiwan’s third force tells Xi Jinping to accept ‘One Country, Two Systems’ has failed

The blunt third force in Taiwanese politics Ko Wen-je – suddenly with a credible path to Taiwan’s presidency – has dismissed claims the island’s approaching election is a choice between ‘war and peace’.

Presidential candidate Ko Wen-je in Taipei on Tuesday. Picture: AFP

The blunt third force in Taiwanese politics, Ko Wen-je – suddenly with a credible path to Taiwan’s presidency – has dismissed claims the island’s approaching election is a choice between “war and peace”, and cautioned that Xi Jinping’s China “won’t last forever”.

With less than 90 days until Taiwan’s January 13 election, the former surgeon has surprised many by passing all but one rival candidate in his “mission ­impossible” election campaign.

Mr Ko, 64, founded his own party, the Taiwan People’s Party, which took him to the Taipei mayor’s office, a traditional launching pad to Taiwan’s highest office.

Now he is being courted by Taiwan’s struggling opposition party, the Kuomintang (KMT), which increasingly sees a unity ticket with Mr Ko as its only chance to return to national government.

“(The KMT’s candidate) isn’t thinking about how to win this election … he’s thinking about how to merge with Ko,” Mr Ko told the Taiwan Foreign Correspondents’ Club in Taipei on Tuesday.

Mr Ko, who has self-diagnosed as having Asperger’s syndrome and frequently speaks of himself in the third person, has up-ended Taiwanese politics. Until his emergence, the scene was dominated by the KMT, Beijing’s preferred party, and President Tsai Ing-wen’s Democratic Progressive Party.

Mr Ko said Beijing would see a victory for the DPP’s presidential candidate, current favourite Vice-President William Lai, as a “victory of the pro-independence forces” in Taiwan.

“If (Lai) wins, it’s going to be a big shock for Beijing,” he said.

But he rejected the framing by the KMT of the upcoming election as a choice between “war and peace”.

“Does voting for the DPP mean war for certain? I don’t think so. Does voting for KMT mean there will never be war?

“That’s a problem we have in Taiwan. People are fighting each other over the terms and slogans.”

America, Taiwan’s most important security partner in the face of constant threats of annexation from Beijing, is closely watching the most complicated race in the island’s three decades as a democracy.

The Biden administration’s top official on Taiwan policy, Laura Rosenberger, last week met all the main political parties on her third trip to Taiwan in eight months.

This week, I had the pleasure to share Taiwan's seafood delicacies with @BoardChairAIT and AIT friends. Our dialogue underscored the Taiwan-U.S. partnership in maintaining peace, stability, and prosperity in the region, deeply rooted in shared values of democracy and freedom.

As… pic.twitter.com/v7SMqv17Xg

— 柯文哲 Ko Wen-Je (@KP_Taiwan) October 20, 2023

Beijing is not only closely following the race but seems to be involving itself in it.

Chinese officials in recent days launched a raid on Foxconn, an electronics company best known for assembling iPhones in China. Many believe it is an attempt to get the company’s billionaire founder, Terry Gou – who launched a presidential campaign after failing to win the KMT’s nomination – to pull out of the race.

China’s party state masthead, the Global Times, which first­ ­revealed the raid, encouraged that interpretation, noting the crowded field of opposition candidates was favouring the “ruling secessionist DPP’s candidate”, Mr Lai.

KMT strategists tell The Australian they hope Mr Gou will pull out in the coming weeks.

But their candidate, Hou Yu-ih, the Mayor of New Taipei, is trailing Mr Ko in the polls, leading to difficult conversations about whether a party with a more than 100-year history might have to settle for a vice-presidential spot on a joint ticket.

Mr Ko has positioned himself as a pragmatic centrist, saying he would be less beholden to China than the KMT and less confrontational than the DPP.

On Tuesday, he urged Taiwan to play a long game with China. “Don’t see Xi’s China as the way China will be forever,” he said.

Mr Ko said his “bottom line” for any negotiations with Beijing was that Taiwan would maintain its “political system of democracy and freedom”, and said he would raise defence spending to 3 per cent of GDP.

He said it was for Beijing to come up with a viable policy ­offering for Taiwan after the failure of China’s “One Country, Two Systems” model in Hong Kong.

“It is China’s duty to propose new plans. It’s not mine.”