Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Taiwan's President Ma Ying-jeou has barely begun his second term as president; yet already he seems to be circling the wagons in a hopeful last-ditch defensive effort to fulfill a final fantasy. It is true that there have been warning signs and indications that popular confidence in him achieving anything was on the wane. His re-election figures certainly told part of the story. In 2008, his margin of victory was by 2, 213, 485 votes; in 2012 after four years of lackluster performance his 2 million plus victory margin votes had dropped to 797,561 votes (327, 973 if one would add James Soong's votes to the opposition). Following that his post election approval ratings have continued to sink down to the embarrassing range of 15 per cent and lower. All these should be signs that he needs to switch gears and work together with the opposition and not isolate himself. Instead he has chosen the opposite path and resorted to new, desperate and unusual measures in his cabinet reshuffle.

“Incompetent” and “arrogant” have often been used by critics to describe President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) in light of his poor governance. However, in view of his administration’s recent personnel reshuffle, it seems “selfish” could also be added to the list of adjectives, given that Ma appears more interested in “leaving a legacy” than in tackling the nation’s economic woes.