Taiwan’s main opposition party has chosen a new reformist leader who is critical of high defence spending but envisions peace with neighbouring China, whose sovereignty claims over the island have long roiled ties.
Members of the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) party, which traditionally has had warm ties with Beijing, voted to elect former lawmaker Cheng Li-wun as chairperson on Saturday.
Cheng, 55, who defeated former Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin and four others, will take over the party leadership on November 1.
The election of Cheng, who warns against letting Taiwan “become the sacrifice of geopolitics”, has deep implications for domestic politics at a time of heightened military and political tensions with China.
While the KMT does not control the presidency, the party and its ally – the small Taiwan People’s Party – together hold enough seats to form a majority bloc in the legislature, creating a headache for the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) trying to get the budget and its legislation passed.
Speaking at party headquarters in Taipei, Cheng said the KMT under her leadership would be a “creator of regional peace”.
“The KMT will make our home the strongest shelter for everyone against life’s storms. Because we will safeguard peace across the Taiwan Strait,” she said. “We must not let Taiwan become a troublemaker.”
Accusations of Chinese interference
Cheng, who started out in politics in the DPP, said during the campaign that she did not support increasing the defence budget, a key policy of President William Lai Ching-te’s administration that also has strong backing from the United States.
Cheng beat the establishment candidate Hau, 73, with more than 50 percent of the vote, though turnout was less than 40 percent of the party members.
But accusations of Chinese interference in the election from a key supporter of Hau’s, the KMT’s vice presidential candidate last year, Jaw Shau-kong, overshadowed the campaign. Jaw said social media accounts had spread disinformation about Hau.
The head of Taiwan’s National Security Bureau, Tsai Ming-yen, said it found more than 1,000 videos discussing the election on TikTok, in addition to 23 YouTube accounts posting related content, with over half of the YouTube accounts based outside of Taiwan. He did not say which candidates these videos supported or directly answer whether they were based in China.
DPP spokesperson Wu Cheng claimed that Chinese interference was obvious and the KMT should carefully guard against it, saying his party hoped that the new chair would prioritise Taiwan’s safety over party interests.
Cheng rejected the allegations of China influencing her party as “very cheap labels”.
Beijing, for its part, said the election was a KMT matter and that some online comments from mainland China internet users did not represent an official stance.
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