Taiwanese politicians flaunt good luck veggies on marketing campaign path
By Sean Ccling
In lots of components of the world, a politician may hope for a picture-perfect second with a voter’s child to spice up their ballot numbers. However in Taiwan, greens are the kings of the marketing campaign path.
Every time the democratic island of 23 million folks goes into election mode, potential candidates race to pose with smorgasbords of greens — massive white radishes are a favorite — gifted by voters hoping to indicate their approval.
The reason being Taiwan’s love of homonyms: phrases that sound similar or comparable however can carry a number of meanings.
In a political tradition infused with good luck symbols and superstition — the place candidates usually search recommendation from feng-shui masters when deciding the situation or opening date of their marketing campaign headquarters — photo-ops with the correct vegetable are routine.
Garlic (suan) is immensely well-liked as a result of when pronounced in Taiwanese it additionally sounds just like the phrase for “chosen”.
The daikon radish (tsai-tao) is a winner as a result of it’s pronounced practically the identical as “good luck”, whereas pineapple (ong-lai) is a homonym for “prosperity comes”.
Ke Chiong-shu, 60, has been promoting greens on the Wuxing Road Market within the capital Taipei for greater than a decade.
A lot of her district’s candidates have visited the market in current weeks as Taiwan gears as much as maintain island-wide native elections on Saturday.
When AFP visited lately, it was former well being minister Chen Shih-chung’s flip to press the flesh as he campaigned for the Taipei mayoralty, probably the most necessary posts up for grabs this weekend.
Ke grabbed some radish and garlic greens from her stall.
“Hope you get elected,” she beamed as Chen proudly rotated to show the gifted veggies to the chanting crowd behind.
“I give to all candidates no matter their social gathering affiliation,” Ke added. “I hope all of them get elected in order that they’ll serve us of us and try for our profit.”
Progressive democracy
After shaking off many years of martial regulation, Taiwan has advanced into one among Asia’s most vibrant and progressive democracies — a stark distinction to Communist Occasion-run China, which claims the island as its personal and has vowed to at some point take it, by power if mandatory.
It could possibly really feel like Taiwan is in near-constant marketing campaign mode.
Presidential and parliamentary elections are held each 4 years and are sometimes dominated by relations with Beijing.
In between are native elections held for quite a lot of positions, from mayoral posts in massive cities to indigenous directors and village chiefs.
Taiwan additionally has referendum legal guidelines that enable voters to repeatedly resolve on a bunch of constitutional points.
Saturday’s native election, for instance, features a referendum on whether or not to decrease the voting age from 20 to 18.
Bread-and-butter points
Native polls are usually a lot much less targeted on geopolitics and centre extra on bread-and-butter points like dangerous roads, stagnant wages and up to date rising inflation.
“One thing that could be very particular about Taiwanese native elections is how personable issues get,” political scientist Lev Nachman, who research Taiwanese electoral politics, advised AFP.
Face-to-face greetings and a handshake or slight bow can go a good distance in garnering help for a candidate.
“Older voters wish to see their politicians in markets and early within the morning out on the streets,” Nachman defined.
Below President Xi Jinping, China has turn into rather more bellicose in direction of Taiwan, and Beijing has lower official communications with the island since President Tsai Ing-wen was first elected in 2016.
Tsai’s Democratic Progressive Occasion, which has gained the final two elections, sees Taiwan as a de facto sovereign nation.
The opposition is dominated by the Kuomintang social gathering, which favours hotter ties with China.
Relations with Beijing plunged in August when it performed enormous army drills round Taiwan to protest a visit to the island by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
However regardless of the very actual menace of battle, the drama has acquired minimal consideration within the lead-up to this Saturday’s polls.
“Though we simply went by way of these very high-tension army drills in August, these aren’t actually being talked about by native candidates,” Nachman mentioned.
“As a substitute, it’s rather more about attacking opponents based mostly on the standard of their character,” he added.
Nonetheless, Lin Pei-ying, 36, a DPP candidate who’s operating for councillor within the northeastern county of Yilan, says she believes her social gathering’s dedication to sustaining Taiwan’s democratic lifestyle will nonetheless feed into voters’ selections.
“We’re sending a message to China,” she advised AFP. “Taiwan is Taiwan, China is China.”
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