Tsai Ing-wen Must Be Well-Prepared in the Face of Xi Jinping’s High-Handed Plan to Extend His Terms

 Tsai Ing-wen Must Be Well-Prepared in the Face of Xi Jinping’s High-Handed Plan to Extend His Terms

United Daily News Editorial (Taipei, Taiwan)

March 1, 2018

 Translation of an Excerpt

The CCP will amend the Constitution, deleting the term limit for state president, eliciting global attention. For the general interpretation in the outside world, this is a measure to remove systemic obstacles for extending Xi Jinping’s term beyond two terms in 2023, paving the way for his long-term rule. In recent years, Mainland China’s composite national strength quickly moves forward, looking like a big power; on the other hand, the CCP's power system, however, has marched toward the point of more centralism, which will inevitably cause a considerable impact on the international order, the regional balance of power, and cross-Strait relations. Taiwan must be well-prepared.

Since Xi Jinping came to office, he deepened reforms in a high-handed fashion and fully implemented anti-corruption measures with a strong will. However, in the process of the rapid centralization of power, Xi has endlessly broken the political precedents followed by the CCP over the past 40 years; the CCP's official organ says that deleting the term limits for state president is to "build a wholesome leadership system for the party and state." The Global Times, the CCP’s official media outlet, says the move does not mean the restoration of the system of state president "serving for life." Besides the so-called not meaning a system "serving for life," the subtext perhaps hints only extending one more term, meaning that Xi Jinping would only focus on seeking a longer term to realize the China dream for a big power. Many people also believe that a rising China needs a high-handed leader with exhalted prestige and reputation to finish the mission of "great renaissance."

In contrast with this is Western democratic politics have also encountered the point of recoil; populism and racial prejudices are tearing asunder the world, with strongman politics spreading across the globe. From Europe, the United States to Asia, including Taiwan, populism is on the rise; no longer smoothly functioning democracy and ineffectual government have led many people to show despair for democracy. This kind of trend has also created a new market for the CCP’s safeguarding stability and new authoritarianism.

For Taiwan, the Tsai government must, more than ever, be prepared to confront the high-handed protagonist on the Mainland for a long term. The possible extended term for Xi Jinping means that Taiwan, in the short term, may perhaps avoid the challenge of reunification by force, but Taiwan must face more intricate pressure for promoting reunification. If Tsai Ing-wen is incapable of galvanizing a consensus for the people on Taiwan, the challenges in cross-Strait relations will only become even thornier. The new national security team must ponder and assess the current situation, not leaving the President’s will to engage in nonsensical confrontation.

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