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TAIPEI: Ma Ying-jeou, the soft spoken former graft buster running
for Taiwan president, is the man to watch after his opposition
nationalist Kuomintang won weekend legislative polls in a landslide.
The Harvard-educated family man with
matinee-idol looks is the candidate to beat in the March 22 polls,
but corruption allegations threatened his chance to run for the
right to succeed outgoing President Chen Shui-bian.
Ma, 57, had a 20-point lead over rival Frank
Hsieh of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in opinion surveys
conducted before Saturday’s parliamentary polls, and observers
say the win is sure to boost his campaign.
Born in Hong Kong in July 1950, Ma came to
Taiwan later that decade with his father Ma He-ling, a
middle-ranking Kuomintang (KMT) official.
A fluent English speaker with a Harvard law
doctorate, Ma has bolstered his clean-living image with daily jogs
and leads a quiet family life with his wife Chou Mei-ching.
His political career began in 1981 when he
served as English interpreter for then-President Chiang Ching-kuo,
chairman of the then-ruling KMT.
He later was appointed vice-chairman of the
Mainland Affairs Council, Taiwan’s top China policy-making body,
serving in the post from 1991 until 1993 before becoming justice
minister.
But his attempt to crack down on corruption
angered some conglomerates and their influential friends in the
then-KMT government, costing him his job in 1996.
He switched to teaching law at the National
Cheng Chi University before being called in by the party in 1998 to
run as Taipei mayor against then-incumbent Chen.
Seen by voters as well educated, refreshingly
clean and cosmopolitan, Ma was considered the only KMT candidate
capable of beating Chen, who had been in the job since 1994.
Ma won the mayoral race, but his rival went on
to win the presidency in 2000 on a plat-form stressing Taiwan’s
indepen-dent identity, ending the KMT’s 51-year rule.
Ma was once seen as a refreshing antidote to the
corruption-mired Chen, whose wife is on trial for graft and his
son-in-law convicted for insider trading.
But then Ma himself was indicted for corruption,
accused of misusing some 11 million Taiwan dollars (US$330,000) in
special expenses during his time as Taipei mayor from 1998 to 2006.
A district court cleared him of the charges in
August last year and the High Court upheld that ruling last month,
clearing the way for Ma to pursue his presidential bid.
But prosecutors have decided to appeal Ma’s
case to the Supreme Court.
Ma’s Hong Kong origins have sometimes marked
him out as a “mainlander” who could potentially sacrifice
Taiwan’s interests for those of China, which still views the
island as part of its territory awaiting reunification.
Ma’s wife Chou works in a bank and is rarely
seen in public. The couple has two daughters.
-- AFP
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