COMMUNICATION: While some academics said there was a widening gap between the president and the KMT, others said the party would back him when necessary 

By Mo Yan-Chih 
STAFF REPORTER 
Wednesday, Jul 09, 2008, Page 3 

ANALYSIS: The recent controversy surrounding the rejection and withdrawal of several nominees for the Control Yuan and the Examination Yuan reflects President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) problematic leadership and stems from conflict within the pan-blue camp, analysts said. 

The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)-dominated legislature rejected Ma’s nominee for vice president of the Control Yuan, Shen Fu-hsiung (沈富雄), a former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmaker, and three other nominees last week.

The KMT caucus further challenged the qualifications and pro-DPP background of Chang Chun-yen (張俊彥), Ma’s nominee for the position of Examination Yuan president, and had threatened to veto his nomination before he announced his withdrawal from the nomination process last Saturday.

“The legislature’s rejection of Ma’s nominees has nothing to do with government performance and everything to do with Ma’s leadership style. He is too arrogant to communicate with legislators,” said Shih Cheng-feng (施正鋒), dean of National Dong Hwa University’s College of Indigenous Studies.

Shih said Ma did not consult the KMT and its legislative caucus before presenting the lists and failed to reach across party affiliations when choosing his nominees

Although Shen and another Control Yuan nominee, Chen Yao-chang (陳耀昌), were both pan-green, they were not endorsed by the DPP because of their harsh criticism of the party in the past, Shih said.

Several KMT legislators who had left the People First Party (PFP) to join the KMT were also upset about the nominations, as Ma chose Wang Chien-shien, a New Party member, over PFP Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) as his candidate for Control Yuan president.

“The Presidential Office did not consult us before presenting the list, therefore it can’t expect us to support all the nominees on the list,” KMT Legislator and former PFP member Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) had said before the voting took place.

Ma’s problematic leadership and apparent snubbing of the KMT and its legislative caucus during the nomination process has widened the rift between him and KMT Chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) and Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平), and generated louder complaints from party legislators, who feel that they have been ignored despite their efforts in campaigning for Ma during the presidential election, Shih said, urging Ma to make compromises in the nominations.

“Ma should understand the art of give-and-take in politics and be more generous in giving some of the positions to Wu, Wang and Soong’s people,” he said.

Political analyst Wang Kung-yi (王崑義), a professor at National Taiwan Ocean University, said the KMT has been mired in endless internal disputes since taking power, and warned that Ma could face more challenges from within his own party, as the KMT’s old guard, led by Wu, Wang and former chairman Lien Chan (連戰), was adopting a hostile position toward him.

Although the KMT caucus’ rejection of several nominees could damage Ma’s authority, Wang Kun-yi said, the KMT old guard would not threaten him, dismissing KMT legislators’ criticism as the mere venting of frustrations.

“If Ma wanted to take over the KMT chairmanship, nobody in the pan-blue camp, including Wu, would be able to stop him,” he said. 

Lee Shiao-feng (李筱峰), a professor of Taiwanese history at Shih Hsin University, said the KMT caucus took advantage of the voting on Control Yuan and Examination Yuan nominees to show that the caucus would continue to monitor the government.

“The nomination of the two government bodies does not involve major policymaking ... I think the KMT will still be supportive of Ma at critical moments,” he said.