19 mars 2012

Elections à Taiwan - Comment [mal] va la démocratie à Taiwan ? (1)

J'ai suivi ces élections en lisant le Taipei Times. Le Taipei Times est un journal en Anglais édité à Taiwan, dont les articles sont souvent traduits du Liberty Times, journal en chinois. Liberty Times est un journal d'opposition au pouvoir KMT, donc plutôt favorable au DPP.
J'ai pu discuter avec des amis à Taiwan, mais le sujet est délicat, j'ai eu plus de confidences de la part de mes amis qui étaient côté DPP, ou TSU (Taiwan Solidarity Union), et associés aussi à Tati. Bien sur, je suis un sympathisant du DPP.

Dans ces élections, globalement, deux partis s'opposaient, le KMT (Kuomintang) et le DPP (Democratic Progressive Party, Minjintang). Le DPP a une idéologie centrée sur Taiwan, alors que le KMT (actuel) milite pour la libéralisation des échanges inter-détroit.
A propos de ces deux partis :
  • We have two parties: One party, the KMT, is old and redundant and bears a savage and terrible history, but wears slightly better suits. It wins elections. The other, the DPP, is young, often hysterical, open to charges of duplicity at its core, and dismally without real ambition to improve Taiwanese political and social life. It loses elections (Taipei Times). 
  • What makes the DPP different from the [KMT] is the DPP’s insistence on Taiwan’s sovereignty, dignity, freedom and democracy when it comes to dealing with China. These differences are quintessential DPP values (Taipei Times).
  • To go on voting for the [KMT] is to live in a very gloomy yet dissolute past and to deny the achievements of the last generation. To vote for the [DPP] is to take a risk on a rather flaky bunch of folk, who quarrel as much among themselves as with the KMT, are easily persuaded from paths of political righteousness and who seem reluctant to address the totality of the major social and economic problems facing Taiwan (Taipei Times).
Le site Tati a fait une page interessante sur les publicités télévisées du KMT et du DPP.

Le Résultat


Taipei Times Editorial Cartoon



Ma Ying-jeou (KMT) : 6,891,139 voix (51.60%)
Tsai Ing-wen (DPP) : 6,093,578 voix (45.63%)
James Soong (PFP) : 369,588

Au parlement taiwanais (113 sièges) :

(Pan-blue coalition:)
KMT : 64
PFP (People First Party) : 3

(Pan-Green coalition:)
DPP : 40
TSU : 3

Autres : 3

C'est une (double) défaite pour le DPP, avec notamment presque 800,000 voix de différence avec Ma Ying-jeou. L'amplitude de cette défaite est bien au-delà de ce qui était prévu par le DPP, ou par les derniers sondages "officiels".

Le DPP s'attendait à un match beaucoup plus serré avec le KMT, et pensait gagner l'élection présidentielle avec une (faible) avance de 100,000 voix.

Les interrogations

Une lettre au Taipei Times, qui reflète le sentiments de beaucoup de sympathisants DPP :
I went back to Taiwan to vote in the Jan. 14 presidential election. Frankly, I feel surprised and puzzled that [...] Tsai Ing-wen was defeated. Two weeks before the elections, polls showed this would be a tight race. [...] Throughout the campaign, Tsai seemed to be very popular and enjoy a lot of support from voters.

On the other hand, President Ma Ying-jeou, in the last week of his campaign, together with his wife, carried out only a few activities, such as canvasing streets and receiving symbolic gifts, which are normally restricted to the start of a campaign. In other words, his campaign lacked momentum and he was keeping a low profile. Apparently he was losing voter support.

During my stay in Taiwan, most people I was in contact with had the optimistic expectation that Tsai would win the election. Anyway, Tsai lost the election. Besides the inherent unfairness and the abuse of the government apparatus, China, business tycoons and the US [...] did irreparable damage to Tsai’s campaign.

Still, a big question is what was the scale of abuse from the government apparatus. Especially, whether the technicalities of vote counting and tallying were transparent, fair and impartial, or had been tampered with.

Ma could not arouse support before the election, but he won big. This is really fishy.
Voici un autre article qui conclut la défaite de Tsai : Tsai:No tears for a tough fighter

“Rather than a victory for Ma, I would say it was a victory for [Chinese President] Hu Jintao’s Taiwan policy line — yi shang wei zheng,” Chang said, refering to Beijing’s united front policy to gradually force Taiwan to submit to its political will by throwing the country economic lifelines.