Cheng Li-wun hopes the people of Taiwan can be proud to be Chinese, accuses the United States of using the self-governing island as an ATM and wants to cut defence spending.
Last Saturday she was elected chair of Taiwan’s main opposition party the Kuomintang (KMT) and the following day she received a message of congratulation from Xi Jinping.
The KMT fought a civil war against the Communist Party before fleeing to Taiwan and establishing the Republic of China there in 1949. But the party wants friendlier relations with Beijing and Xi said he hoped they could work together to oppose any move towards independence for Taiwan.
“Based on this shared ground, the two sides have promoted cross-Strait exchanges and co-operation, worked to safeguard peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, and enhanced the kinship and wellbeing of compatriots on both sides, achieving positive results,” he said.
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Cheng said in her reply that she was committed to closer relations with Beijing based on the shared heritage of the people of Taiwan and those in mainland China and on the “1992 Consensus”. This refers to an agreement between the KMT and the Communist Party that both believed in a One China policy but they each took a different view on what it meant.
A dark horse candidate a few weeks ago, Cheng defeated five rivals to win 50.15 per cent of the KMT membership vote for party chair. A former member of William Lai’s governing Democratic People’s Party (DPP), Cheng is now its fiercest critic, accusing the president of threatening the island’s democratic institutions.
The KMT lost the last three presidential elections, although Lai won last year against a divided opposition with just 40 per cent of the vote and the DPP lost its majority in the national legislature. The governing party tried to wrest back the majority by subjecting 31 KMT legislators to recall votes but failed in every contest.
A former political talkshow host, Cheng has promised to transform the KMT from “a flock of sheep” into “a pack of lions” ahead of next year’s local elections and the 2028 presidential election. And she has been bolder than most of her party colleagues in criticising the government’s policies towards Beijing and Washington in the wake of Donald Trump’s imposition of a 20 per cent tariff on Taiwan.
“If Lai’s daily posture is to ‘confront China’ at such a critical moment, he ends up handing Taiwan’s agency and voice to Washington, leaving Taiwan as a bargaining chip between the US and Beijing and letting China-US deals decide the fate of Taiwan. That’s unacceptable. So I keep stressing this: we need to take back the initiative and our voice – starting with cross-Strait reconciliation led by both sides, so outsiders can’t play us off each other,” she said last month in an interview with influencer Kuan Chan.
Under pressure from Washington, Lai has increased Taiwan’s defence spending to 3 per cent of GDP and promised to bring it up to 5 per cent. Cheng wants to cut it, pointing to Japan’s defence spending of 1.8 per cent of GDP and South Korea’s 2.2 per cent.
“Why are we pouring money into war? Why are we pushing our kids towards the battlefield instead of investing in peace? This is exactly why I’m running for party chair: the KMT has a critical choice to make – war or peace. Only cross-Strait reconciliation, co-operation and peace can truly let people in Taiwan live and work without fear,” she said.
“People in Taiwan need to be smart: don’t just trail behind Washington’s missteps. We should have agency and a clear sense of our own interests, rather than becoming Washington’s pawn or letting ourselves be bled dry.”
