An estimated 500,000 people took to the streets of Kaohsiung on Saturday calling for Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) to be removed from his position as Kaohsiung mayor.
At the same time, an additional 350,000, according to Han’s campaign team, attended a march to show support for the election hopeful.
Han’s supporters took to the city’s north in a march announced on December 8, an apparently deliberate attempt to counter the previously announced anti-Han rally set to take place in the south of Kaohsiung. Major clashes were avoided as the parade routes maintained a distance of at least 3 kilometers. Kaohsiung police deployed 3,000 officers in case of scuffles.
Kaohsiung’s MRT system felt the strain as the thousands made their way from across the city—and across the country—to join the rallies. Long queues formed at major stations including Zuoying, Formosa Boulevard, and Aozidi, the rallying point for the pro-Han camp.
A sea of red and blue confronted those exiting near Aozidi Park, where masses of supporters waved banners and wore regalia emblazoned with the Republic of China (ROC) flag. Vendors hawked everything from plush toys of Han Kuo-yu to shirts, hats, banners, and coats for dogs.
The atmosphere was convivial as fans, amid blaring music and airhorns, chanted slogans such as “Dong suan Han Kuo-yu!” (Vote for Han Kuo-yu!) and sang along to familiar campaign songs. The march began at 1.11pm (the date of next year’s presidential election) along a trail in Kaohsiung’s Gushan District that led to Smile Park.
Han took to the main stage to thank his supporters at the end of the march, foregoing his initial plan to lead it due to safety concerns.
Han supporters march through the streets of north Kaohsiung. (Photo: Ryan Drillsma)
As expected, the crowd was typically much older than that at the southern rally to remove Han from office, with middle-aged and elderly revelers making up the majority of the parade. There were notably some younger attendees, however, openly professing support for Han.
Han’s upstart campaign may have peaked shortly after he announced he would run for President. He has seen his poll figures slide since June, when pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong dovetailed with a series of highly publicized gaffes by the Kaohsiung mayor.
I took to the streets at the pro-Han rally to gauge which issues his supporters were most concerned with and why they thought Han would make a better president than the incumbent, Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文).
One major difference between Saturday’s march and previous smaller rallies was the majority of people appeared to have arrived of their own accord, rather than being bused in from surrounding areas. Although many people I spoke to were from Kaohsiung, some had made the trip from other parts of Taiwan. One woman explained that she had spent almost NT$3,000 on a return high-speed rail ticket to go to Kaohsiung and support Han.
The rally, and Han’s campaign in general, appeared to have incensed people previously disinterested in politics. Everyone I interviewed said it was imperative to vote, saying it is up to the people to decide the future of Taiwan.
The crowds in Kaohsiung’s north and south have very different ideas of Taiwan’s ideal future.
Han’s supporters see themselves as citizens of the ROC, not of Taiwan. (Photo: Ryan Drillsma)
“This is actually my first time voting,” said Wu Jia-lin, a 60-year-old homemaker from Taoyuan. “I’ve never voted or cared about politics before, but I’ve been following Han for a while because I care about our government now.”
“Tsai Ing-wen has spent too much time and money on things that do not benefit the people, like reopening the coal plant,” Wu said, referencing the Shen’ao coal fired plant which Tsai’s administration had planned to expand before shelving the project under pressure.
The majority of those interviewed believed Kaohsiung has changed for the better under Han Kuo-yu, with only one remaining skeptical.
Peixuan, a 35-year-old who works for a shipping company, said she believes air quality and tourist numbers have improved over the past year. Two respondents believed Han had taken adequate measures to ensure flooding was not as serious as previous years, despite flooding in parts of the city causing him to cancel a Taichung campaign stop in July.
Attendees all believed Han did a good job presenting his platform at Wednesday’s presidential “debate”—billed as a televised presentation of policy—and deflecting criticism from his rivals. One young couple did express, however, that they wish they heard more about his policy platform rather than his criticisms of the other candidates.
Attendees were unabashed in criticizing the incumbent president. I was approached by several people who told me they believe Tsai’s doctorate degree “is fake” and that she needs to be removed from office. One went as far as to suggest Tsai’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) had bought media influence to smear the Han campaign, an allegation gaining popularity among KMT supporters despite a lack of evidence to support it.
“I think Tsai has paid the media to frame Han with scandals,” said A-xuan, a 37-year-old hair stylist.
He also expressed skepticism at Beijing’s reported media disinformation campaign targeting the Tsai administration and the ruling DPP.
“The internet in Taiwan has only been infiltrated by [Tsai’s] 1450 army,” he said—a term used to describe pro-DPP internet trolls by the opposition. “If such a large and powerful country as China wanted to take over Taiwan, it could do it in a matter of days, so why would they need to permeate the media? It makes no sense.”
Although Han’s support base skews older, a handful of young Han fans showed up at Saturday’s rally.
Wu Sz-huai (吳斯懷), although not present at Saturday’s march, has become a hotly debated figure among both pro- and anti-Han camps due to his place on the KMT party list and connections with Chinese officials. Some attendees said they did not know enough about his history to comment, while others suggested one controversial figure in the legislature could not upset democracy.
One interviewee, however, claimed to be an old friend of Wu’s and praised the legislative candidate.
“Wu was my classmate at military academy,” said the 63-year-old businessman surnamed Zhang, “and his people skills were always excellent. His lower classmates always admired him. He has always been patriotic and sacrificed a lot for his country. He has contributed a lot to the Republic of China and would ensure China once again becomes a whole nation under the ROC.”
Zhang was also keen to blare out some of Han’s slogans and catchphrases such as “love and inclusiveness” (愛與包容).
Everyone I talked to did agree on one thing: The presidential polls are unreliable. Han has called on his supporters to stop participating in public opinion polls, an apparent effort to call them into question as they consistently show Tsai surge ahead.
“The polls are completely made up,” Zhang said. “Just by looking around you now you can tell they are untrustworthy.”
Paul, a 43-year-old from Taipei, insisted that polls could be easily obscured or manipulated “just like the news.”
Everyone I interviewed, aside from one person who said they were unsure who to vote for but would like to give Han a chance, identified themselves as “citizens of the Republic of China” rather than as Taiwanese. Many stated this was an “obvious fact.”
Attendees clearly felt unity under the label “common people” (庶人), which not only featured on billboards, signs and posters, but was espoused by many people I spoke to. Han’s supporters felt they were being left behind by a government out of touch with the needs of local people who suffer most during economic downturns.
“Salaries for young people are too low,” she said. “They can’t buy houses; how can they raise a family on [a monthly salary of] NT$30,000 (around US$1,000)?”
“Han is doing it for us, for the common people,” Wu Jia-lin said, “not for himself. His heart is out for the people, whereas our current president is only out to benefit herself and we need to remove her from office.”
(Cover photo by Ryan Drillsma)
