How Is a Lame Duck Cabinet Going to Handle the Challenge of Local Gov’ts’ New Deal?

 How Is a Lame Duck Cabinet Going to Handle the Challenge of Local Gov’ts’ New Deal?

United Daily News Editorial (Taipei, Taiwan)

December 25, 2018

 Translation of an Excerpt

After the DPP’s stunning defeat in the 9-in-1 local elections, Lai Ching-te tendered his resignation to the President, but was asked to stay on. However, he announced that "when the time comes, I will leave"; therefore, he has created an "interregnum effect" of the government.

Popular grievances erupted massively during the campaigns before these elections not only because Cabinet ministers did not take people's livelihoods into consideration, but more importantly because of the people’s dissatisfaction to the extreme over the approach of struggles on the part of the Lai Cabinet's "politics reign supreme." Who knew, even before the soul-searching for the DPP’s electoral defeat began, the Transformational Justice Commission (TJC), nevertheless played the role of "Super Cabinet" with a high profile, demanding that the Central Bank, Defense Ministry and the Culture Ministry cooperate to push the Project "de-Chiang Kai-shek." In addition, the Central Election Commission did not reflect on the fact that it made a big mess in the operations of the electoral process, but, surprisingly, immediately was thinking of revising the Plebiscite Act. The Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Commission did not stay on the sidelines, either; it targeted the Hua Hsing Children’s Home, which has taken care of numerous wartime orphans in the past. The "Dong Chang-gate" has become so active and agitated, showing that this government fundamentally did not conduct self-reflection, and fundamentally does not know where the people stand.

Precisely because the Premier situates himself in a "caretaker" status, Cabinet ministers and the lower-echelon officials find themselves in peril, leaving the Cabinet in an extremely embarrassing situation; the entire Cabinet has nearly been mired in a state of semi-paralysis.

The new chiefs of local governments will be sworn in today (December 25^th), turning over a new page in local governments; the new-deal local governments will inevitably make the central government feel increasingly greater pressure. That Taoyuan Mayor Cheng Wen-tsan forced the central government to include Taoyuan City in the tourism subsidies program is a case in point. That Ko Wen-je repeated his tune of the “two sides of the Strait are like family” at the Twin Cities Forum is another case in point. Han Kuo-yu’s announcements of city administration in Kaohsiung, one after another, while, Lu Shiow-yen in Taichung doesn’t want to play second fiddle, either; the Mainland even has certain expectations that the 15 counties and cities under KMT rule will form an alliance. All these announced in advance the arrival of the era of "localities encircling the central government."

In the campaign preceding the presidential election in the new year featuring the fight for supremacy between the ruling and opposition parties, it will be even more difficult for the “weak central government” to flex its muscles. This is also the principal reason why it is not easy for Tsai Ing-wen to find a new premier. What impact this will have on the DPP’s prospects in the presidential election, the DPP knows by heart and the people are also very clear.

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