Taiwan’s Chen Is Urged to Begin His 2nd Term Quietly

President Chen Shui-bian has come under intense pressure to tone down his rhetoric as he prepares to deliver an inaugural address Thursday widely expected to set out the political agenda for his second four-year term.

The controversial leader, whose desire to create greater political distance from mainland China kept tensions high across the Taiwan Strait during much of his first four years in office, has reportedly been cautioned by senior U.S. officials to keep the speech free of fiery language or surprises that could anger Beijing.

Late Sunday, mainland authorities weighed in with a searing, highly personal attack on Chen’s first term coupled with a warning that they would crush any move he might make toward Taiwanese independence.

But as Beijing and Washington focus on containing Chen during the early days of his second term, political analysts believe that a significant cooling in voter attitudes toward mainland China poses a greater challenge to the future of this long-simmering trouble spot.

Polls conducted last month for the government showed that public support for unification with the mainland continued to decline, with less than 12% of those surveyed favoring either immediate or eventual unification, compared with more than twice that number three years ago. The polls indicated that the majority of Taiwan’s voters wanted no immediate change in the cross-strait relationship.

“It will complicate the search for a solution,” summed up George Tsai, a research fellow at the Institute of International Relations at the National Chengchi University in Taipei. “Both sides will have to show greater flexibility.”

Under the uneasy status quo, Beijing claims Taiwan as part of China, while Taiwan -- under America’s protection -- exists as a de facto independent state, albeit one largely isolated from the world community because of China’s persistent diplomatic efforts.

Political analysts believe that during his presidency Chen has played to shifting public sentiments generated in part by the policies of his predecessor, Lee Teng-hui, who fostered a separate national identity through initiatives such as changing the school curriculum to stress Taiwanese history. Chen has also encouraged this change in attitude.

Taiwan’s political ground has shifted far enough that influential members of the once-dominant Nationalist Party are now openly calling for an end to the party’s long-standing commitment to the idea that the only option for Taiwan is eventual unification with mainland China -- an idea also known as the “one-China policy.”

“Any party in Taiwan promoting a one-China policy today faces the death penalty,” stated Leslie Chang, spokesman for a group of mid-level Nationalist Party members who were born after 1949, the year Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek retreated to Taiwan with the remnants of his army after its defeat by the Communists in a civil war. “There’s no market for it here, especially among young people.”

Though older party members -- most of them born in mainland China -- found themselves comfortable backing unification, time and generational change have combined to erode support for the idea. China’s hostile stance toward Taiwan, including the deployment of ballistic missiles aimed at the island, has also soured voters.

Voices within the Nationalist Party advocating the changes include legislators and central committee members, mainly from the party’s younger ranks. They argue that backing unification as a sole alternative has become an electoral liability that will only become greater as more young people with little or no emotional attachment to the mainland become voters.

Apollo Chen, a Nationalist member of parliament representing a Taipei constituency, said that the party should consider independence from the mainland as a possibility.

“We have to let voters know that unification is not the only option for our party,” said Chen, who is no relation to the president. “We’re not saying independence now, but we want voters to know that this is an option for the longer run.”

Chen agreed that any such change in the party’s position would probably upset Beijing, but said the alternative of maintaining the existing policy could condemn the Nationalists to permanent opposition status. Nationalist spokesman Justin Chou said such comments still reflected a minority view within the party, but admitted, “We don’t even want to discuss the one-China idea.”

During last winter’s election campaign, party candidate Lien Chan deliberately downplayed the idea of unification, but the policy itself remained unchanged. Many party members said the lack of a clear policy toward China contributed to their narrow election defeat.

Chou and others said the party was scheduled to begin gathering grass-roots reaction to these and other proposals at a series of open meetings beginning late next month, before drafting a new party platform in August, well in time for December’s elections to the national legislature.