In the 2022 Taiwan County Mayoral Election, the DPP deliberately adopted the method of conscription and decided on the "six capitals" candidates, although there was noise in the party, but it was not surprising for the DPP, which has become increasingly authoritarian and overbearing. Recently, the DPP has begun to solicit relevant candidates, former "Minister of Transport" Lin Jialong was asked to run for mayor of Taipei, and "Minister of Health and Welfare" Chen Shizhong was asked to run for mayor of Taoyuan.
In the first half of this year, Keelung Mayor Lin Youchang transferred to Taipei City, and the rumors of Hsinchu Mayor Lin Zhijian's transfer to Taoyuan City have not been broken, and examining the footprints of the two people, they have indeed frequently carried out cross-county and city walking layouts, and in the end, both of them have been determined by local shooting.
In the current situation, the "three capitals" of the "six capitals" of Taipei City, New Taipei City, and Taichung City, if there are no accidents, the DPP has almost certainly lost its position, and the only ones who are sure to take it are the "two capitals" of Tainan and Kaohsiung. Therefore, the importance of Taoyuan City to the DPP is self-evident. However, Taipei City is the "first capital", in the county and city elections, not only the focus of the media locked, the election results, but also the energy of Taipei Mayor Ke Wenzhe to challenge 2024.
In Taipei City, the DPP calculated that Ko Wen-che's aura would be difficult to transfer to his successor, and that if Vice Mayor Huang Shanshan ran for office, it might become a copy of Yao Wenzhi in the last Taipei mayoral election, and the Kuomintang and the Kuomintang would have the opportunity to fight. However, such a calculation is obviously too wishful thinking, and the overthrow of the DPP has now become a blue-and-white consensus, and the DPP will calculate, will neither the KMT nor Ko Wen-che count?
In the 2010 "municipal mayor" election, when Su Zhenchang and Tsai Ing-wen were calculating the "big position" in 2012, Su Zhenchang took the lead in announcing her candidacy for mayor of Taipei, and Tsai Ing-wen was forced to run for mayor of New Taipei, although in the end both of them lost, but the energy accumulated by Tsai Ing-wen was obviously higher than that of Su Zhenchang, who was carefully calculated, and laid the foundation for Tsai Ing-wen's future candidacy for the 2012 and 2016 "general elections".
From past experience, if Lin Jialong chooses to come back to the election and run for New Taipei City to duel with Hou Youyi, it is obviously more advantageous than running for Taipei City. On the one hand, Lin Jialong has no desire to run for mayor of New Taipei; on the other hand, he pushes Lin Jialong, who is the "young lord of the orthodox faction," to Taipei City, and still hopes that New Taipei City will be left to "New Sulian" people to run, such as Lin Shufen of the new department or Su Qiaohui, daughter of Su Zhenchang.
However, it is not known whether the "new trend" of holding power is carried away by the desire for power; if the DPP's candidates in New Taipei City are too weak, and then Hou Youyi is allowed to lie down and run for election, then Hou Youyi will be able to penetrate the north and south to other counties and cities to supplement the election, so as to accumulate human feelings for the future attack on the "big position." The whirlwind that will blow up at that time may not be overwhelmed by the DPP. Therefore, whether Lin Jialong will run for Taipei City is probably too early.
Compared with Shuangbei City, Taoyuan City is the place where the DPP will really lay heavy troops, and the main reasons are threefold: First, Taoyuan City is the DPP's ruling and controls the ruling resources; second, the success or failure of Taoyuan City is the key to the SUCCESS or failure of the DPP in the 2022 county and city elections; third, the general physical examination of Mayor Zheng Wencan's ruling achievements will become the key to the development of his career in the future.
In addition, the arrangement of taoyuan mayoral candidates, factional factors are also important considerations, Zheng Wencan is the "new trend department", Zheng Yunpeng and Zheng Baoqing, who want to run, are closely related to the "new trend"; however, in the face of the political structure of blue being greater than green, whether the two can 100% undertake Zheng Wencan's aura of "surpassing blue and green" is really marked with a question mark. Also because Taoyuan could not lose, the DPP thought about recruiting a dark horse that was acceptable to the "new trend" grassroots and had a high reputation throughout Taiwan to run.
Whether the DPP recruits Chen Shizhong to run for mayor of Taipei or Taoyuan, it will face problems such as the lack of epidemic prevention policies and improper vaccine procurement by the Tsai Ing-wen authorities, including the "China Airlines Novofute case" and the "3+11" incident, which are the top priorities. Because Taipei City has Ke Wenzhe sitting in town, the content of Chen Shizhong's response is easily punctured by Ke Wenzhe; on the other hand, Chen Shizhong's candidacy for Taoyuan City will encounter relatively small challenges. Therefore, if there is no accident, the DPP Taoyuan mayoral candidate should have already been called out.
(This article is a comment by Taiwanese observer Yu Ruiming in the Taiwanese media China Times on October 23.)