Opinion | The Real Author of Taiwan’s Political Crisis Isn’t in the Blue Camp — It’s Huang Kuo-chang

By Tân Ka-hông (陳嘉宏)

As Taiwan’s unprecedented recall movement gains momentum, with more than a million citizens rallying to remove over 30 legislators, it’s tempting to read the moment as a backlash against the Kuomintang’s (KMT) recent power grab. But to understand how we got here — to this point of constitutional brinkmanship and civic outrage — we must look not to the usual suspects in the Blue camp, but to an unlikely figure: Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌).

Once a symbol of progressive aspiration as a leader of the 2014 Sunflower Movement, Huang now operates as a party-list legislator, shielded from direct electoral accountability. And from this unaccountable position, he has become one of the chief enablers of Taiwan’s constitutional and legislative crisis.

It was Huang who appeared at KMT chair Eric Chu’s side last month to call for the recall of President Lai Ching-te — a move that generated headlines but, tellingly, no follow-through. When asked weeks later what had happened to the plan, Huang casually responded, “We just don’t have the people.” What mattered to him was not organizing a real campaign, but securing his slice of the news cycle.

More troubling is Huang’s ongoing crusade to abolish the Control Yuan — Taiwan’s oversight branch — with sweeping and oversimplified rhetoric. He labels its members “lapdogs” of the ruling party, dismissing an entire constitutional institution as illegitimate simply because it does not serve his current agenda. He claims to stand against cronyism, yet offers no roadmap for democratic oversight beyond handing investigative powers to a legislature already captured by partisan interests.

The irony is thick. In the early 2000s, when then-president Chen Shui-bian attempted to nominate new members to the Control Yuan, the KMT blocked them, leaving the body paralyzed for over three years. Yet when Ma Ying-jeou, a KMT president, made similar nominations, the institution quietly resumed functioning. The problem was never structural — it was political.

This is why calls to abolish the Control Yuan ring hollow when they come from politicians like Huang, who speak of reform but work hand-in-hand with deeply conservative forces. Under the guise of democratization, Huang has instead served as the Blue camp’s mouthpiece for legislative overreach. He gives their agenda the illusion of populist legitimacy — all while consolidating his own voice and visibility.

Last year’s so-called “Legislative Expansion Act” — which grossly enhanced legislative powers while undermining judicial independence — was co-authored in spirit by Huang. Though pushed by KMT strongman Fu Kun-chi, it was Huang’s intellectual and political cover that gave the bill traction. The two now operate in tandem: one grabs power, the other spins the narrative.

And Huang has continued pushing Taiwan toward constitutional chaos. He has bypassed negotiation and consensus-building. He has aired manipulated judicial recordings on the floor of the legislature. He has even proposed livestreaming court proceedings — without consultation with the legal profession — in a way that disregards the complexity of judicial transparency and risks turning justice into spectacle.

This is not the politics of reform. It’s opportunism masquerading as activism. Huang may no longer speak for the movement that once lifted him up, but he still knows how to weaponize its symbols and language — even as he tears down the very structures of accountability it once fought to defend.

There’s a character in Taiwanese puppet theater known as the "Soe-bóe-tō-jîn (衰尾道人)" — the jinxed hermit who always walks away unscathed while misfortune falls on others. Huang Kuo-chang has become that character in real life: every political party or institution he touches suffers, yet he remains, louder and more visible than ever.

The recall movement is not about revenge. It is about reclaiming democratic legitimacy. That the movement has been sparked in part by a figure once seen as a reformist only underscores how urgently Taiwan must reckon with the dangers of unaccountable power — regardless of what flag it flies under.

--



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why Taiwan's Nuclear-Free Path Still Makes Strategic Sense

Image
When Taiwan shut down the Maanshan Nuclear Power Plant’s second reactor on May 17, it crossed a historic threshold: becoming Asia’s first fully nuclear-free country. Critics quickly pounced. In an age of intensifying energy demand—especially from AI, data centers, and industry—some argue that this bold step is a strategic misstep. They claim nuclear power is clean, stable, and essential for Taiwan’s economic competitiveness and carbon neutrality. But these critiques are based on assumptions that don’t hold up under scrutiny. In fact, Taiwan’s nuclear-free transition is not only rational—it’s imperative. The risks of nuclear energy on a densely populated, earthquake-prone island are unmanageable. The costs are high, the waste unsolvable, and the promise of nuclear revival more myth than reality. Taiwan’s future lies in smarter, safer energy—not in extending the life of outdated reactors. The Inconvenient Geography of Nuclear Power Taiwan’s geographic vulnerabilities are not ...
Read more

Opinion | China Isn’t Conquering the Global Economy. It’s Liquidating Itself.

Image
By a Southeast Asia-based supply chain manager For years, China’s global ambitions have been framed in terms of dominance: building the Belt and Road, scaling AI and green tech, rewriting the rules of trade. But standing on the factory floors of Southeast Asia today, I see something far less triumphant—and far more desperate. It doesn’t feel like a rise. It feels like a clearance sale. Across industries—solar panels, electric vehicles, steel, home appliances—Chinese goods are flooding international markets at prices that defy logic. Not efficiency. Not even state-backed competition. But loss-leading liquidation. From my vantage point inside the manufacturing networks of Thailand and Vietnam, what’s unfolding looks less like economic expansion and more like an attempt to offload unsustainable overcapacity before the music stops. The Illusion of Expansion On paper, China’s export engine appears intact. In reality, it’s wheezing. Factories are pushing goods out the door at cos...
Read more

Taiwan's Nuclear-Free Dream Meets a Harsh Reality

Image
Maanshan Nuclear Power Plant (Source: Wikipedia) On May 17, 2025, Taiwan shut down the last operating reactor at its Maanshan nuclear power plant, completing its decades-long journey toward becoming Asia’s first fully nuclear-free country. The moment was historic, yet subdued. No grand celebration, no political fanfare. Just the quiet hum of a reactor winding down—a symbolic end to a technological era. But as the lights dimmed at Maanshan, a harsher truth came into focus: Taiwan’s nuclear exit may solve one problem, but it leaves behind four much bigger ones—decommissioning, nuclear waste, carbon emissions, and renewable waste. The Illusion of Closure For years, the phrase “Nuclear-Free Homeland” has been a mantra in Taiwan’s political discourse—an article of faith embraced by successive governments and environmental movements. The policy appealed to a collective memory still haunted by Japan’s 2011 Fukushima disaster, which struck just across the East China Sea. In a densely populated...
Read more