Vegetable seller: A pawn under the cooperation of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party

As expected, Kaohsiung City, Taiwan held a referendum yesterday (6.6.2020) on the removal of Mayor Mai Cailang. The result was 939,090 votes to 25,051 votes to approve his removal. The number of votes exceeded his election as mayor in 2018. of 892,545 votes. Of course, the political career of Cailang in the future is still undecided, but his ups and downs in Taiwan's political arena in the past two years just reflect the fate of politicians who voted for the Communist Party: not only rejected by Taiwanese voters, but more importantly, when you have no use value, In the end, he became the abandoned pawn of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party.

Political career with ups and downs <br class="smart">Over the years, the political career of the vegetable seller can be regarded as ups and downs: at first, he served as an assistant to the Taipei County Councilor, was elected as a Taipei County Councilor in 1990, and in 1993 he served as a senator He was elected as a legislator and was re-elected for two consecutive terms. In the 2001 legislature election, he was placed in a lower position in the non-regional list by the Kuomintang and lost. This became the first time in his life that he faded out of politics after losing the election.

In 2007, Selling Cailang was invited to serve as the deputy mayor of Zhonghe City. During this period, he ran for the legislator again, but was disqualified in the party primary election. In 2013, Hao Longbin served as the mayor of Taipei and was invited to serve as the general manager of the Taipei Agricultural Transportation Company (Beinong). In 2017, he finally resigned due to pressure from the Democratic Progressive Party after he came to power, and later announced his candidacy for the KMT The chairman lost again. However, in the past, he was favored by the Kuomintang because of his heated debates with the DPP city councilors on the Internet about the personnel issues of the general manager of Beinong. He was arranged to take over as the chairman of the Kaohsiung City Party Committee and was preparing to deploy for the Kaohsiung City election in 2018. .

Populist Hallyu sweeping Kaohsiung <br class="smart">Politicians often use populist methods to win support from voters. Since the 1990s, the economic growth has not been comparable to that of the other five capitals. Young people have been working in poverty for a long time and stay in the low-income group. They are forced to go to Taipei or Taichung to work, becoming the generation of "North Drifters" in Taiwan.

In the past, the Democratic Progressive Party has been in power in Kaohsiung for many years. Their discussion is only the direction of the elite, but it does not help solve practical problems. Kaohsiung's economic development is still not improving. As a result, the appearance of the vegetable seller made them full of expectations, and he successfully portrayed the image of the common people. He was different from the traditional Kuomintang elites from other provinces. "Goods can go out, people can come in, and Kaohsiung will make a fortune."

In fact, the merchants and small and medium-sized enterprises in Kaohsiung expect that after the vegetable seller takes office, the local area can return to the past when the Kuomintang Ma Ying-jeou was in power to promote the economic development of cross-strait business and tourism, and bring more tourists from powerful countries to promote related industrial chains to improve the economy. As a result, this "Korean wave" brought a whirlwind of anti-discourse, anti-politics, and anti-elite from Kaohsiung, representing the economic counterattack that Kaohsiung people have been waiting for. In the end, Cailang defeated the opponent Chen Qimai of the DPP in the 9-in-1 election in 2018, ending the more than 20-year rule of the Green Camp in Kaohsiung.

Fighting for the economy but meeting the CCP’s threat <br class="smart">Cailang’s use of economic development to win the support of Kaohsiung people in the 9-in-1 election coincides with the CCP’s way of uniting Taiwan, and the Kuomintang also wants to Taking advantage of the good situation of the "Korean Wave" has turned into a way out for the 2020 presidential election. When they thought they could continue to focus on the wishful thinking of economic development, Emperor Xi adopted "one country, two systems" as his plan to unify Taiwan early last year, which reversed the political orientation of Taiwan society. On the contrary, Xiaoying seized the important moment to show that Taiwan will never accept "one country, two systems", which turned out to be a turning point for her to be re-elected in the future.

Of course, the bigger factor was the anti-amendment movement that broke out in Hong Kong last year, which drew global attention to the CCP’s vicious suppression of Hong Kong people. Whether it is the vegetable seller, the Kuomintang, or the CCP regime, they seem to be unaware that the above-mentioned changes have affected the future situation of the Kuomintang in the presidential election in Taiwan.

Shortly after taking office as mayor, Cai Cailang went to Hong Kong to visit, and even met with Hao Dade and Wang Zhimin, the then director of the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government. Since then, he has been regarded as a presidential candidate who has been “blessed” by the CCP, and even the spokesperson for the CCP’s entry into Taiwan’s political situation. He will also become "Taiwan's chief executive under the CCP" at any time. Even though he said that this visit only talked about economics and not politics, this kind of "separation of politics and economy" response is already a discussion of political positions, and it is very in line with the CCP's united front approach. Later, when he was asked by the Taiwanese media about his views on the anti-extradition movement in Hong Kong, Cai Cailang responded with "I don't know, I don't know", completely avoiding his pro-communist tendencies.

Integrity and bankruptcy for the election of the president <br class="smart">Until the beginning of June last year, the vegetable seller who had been mayor for less than half a year broke his promise before the election that he would not leave halfway, and expressed his willingness to "passively accept" the recruitment of the Kuomintang Run for president. However, this decision disappointed many Kaohsiung people: At that time, they thought that the vegetable seller would work together with them in Kaohsiung, but now they put Kaohsiung aside and marched into the presidential election. What is "South-South cooperation" and encourages the headquarters of large companies to relocate? Going to Kaohsiung, fighting for the settlement of Disneyland, building a racetrack, F1 racetrack, and the Ferris Wheel of Love... everything is just an empty campaign slogan. Regardless of whether it is the Kuomintang's arrangement that puts the overall situation first, or the political ambition of the vegetable seller himself, many Kaohsiung people feel emotionally that they have become a disposable tool for politicians to use up.

In the end, Cailang successfully participated in the 2020 Taiwan presidential election on behalf of the Kuomintang, and formally asked the Kaohsiung City Government for a month's leave of work on October 16 to fully devote himself to the 2020 presidential election. Although the CCP worked hard to reverse the disadvantages, he only got 5.52 million votes in the presidential election, losing to Xiaoying's 8.17 million votes, and his election for the presidency was declared a failure.

It was the vegetable seller who turned his back on his promise that day, which caused nearly 940,000 Kaohsiung people to decide to pull him down from the mayor. If the vegetable seller could hold his breath that day, instead of focusing on the road to running for the presidency, he would instead concentrate on making good achievements in Kaohsiung first, so as to prepare for the presidential election four years later, maybe things will happen different endings. In contrast, Ke P seems to be much smarter than the vegetable seller: he knows how to adopt the strategy of "building high walls, accumulating food widely, and slowly becoming king". Group parties bide their time.

It can be predicted that after the failure of the current presidential election, the vegetable seller has no use value in the eyes of the CCP regime. Now he is pulled down by the voters in the Kaohsiung referendum. I believe his fate in the future will be the same as that day when he betrayed the people of Kaohsiung. The objective result is the same: eventually become an abandoned pawn under the cooperation of the KMT and the Communist Party.