Taiwan’s ‘Donald Trump’ Loses in Historic Recall

(Bloomberg) -- Residents of the southern Taiwanese port city of Kaohsiung voted overwhelmingly on Saturday to remove their mayor from office, bringing to an end the meteoric political rise and fall of a man dubbed Taiwan's Donald Trump.

Of the 2.3 million citizens eligible to vote, about 40.8% supported the recall of Mayor Han Kuo-yu, while 1.1% opposed it, according to data on the website of the Kaohsiung City Election Commission. Han, Taiwan's first city mayor to be recalled, conceded defeat in a TV broadcast.

“It's unfortunate that our team have been constantly discredited, facing distorted, slanderous and unfounded criticism,” Han said. “I wish all the best to the kind citizens of Kaohsiung and that the next mayor let Kaohsiung people live a good life.”

Civil groups initiated the campaign to oust Han after he accepted the opposition Kuomintang's nomination to run in the presidential election just months after being elected mayor in November 2018, breaking a previous promise he would see out his four-year term. He has been mayor of the city for 18 months.

Han suffered a landslide defeat to President Tsai Ing-wen in January's presidential election.

Saturday's vote likely ends a political career that in 18 months saw Han emerge from relative anonymity to compete for Taiwan's highest office before having to fight for his position as mayor.

The chairman of the opposition KMT, Chiang Chi-chen, urged voters to keep Han in his job in a video Friday. “If the vote to recall Han is successful, not only is it a sign of distrust in him, it's a huge blow to the efforts of the Kaohsiung city government over the past one-and-a-half years.”

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Early last year, Han was riding high. His unlikely victory in the race for mayor of Kaohsiung -- Taiwan's third-largest city -- made him a top contender for the 2020 presidential election. A straight-talking, no-nonsense political outsider who put the economic needs of Kaohsiung's blue-collar workers and farmers first, he pledged to boost the city's economy by attracting more Chinese tourists and selling more agricultural produce across the strait.

His more ambitious plans included persuading Walt Disney Co. to build a theme park and Formula One to host a grand prix race in the city.

His grandiose goals, unrefined, populist rhetoric and his background in business rather than politics led to comparisons with Trump. Han's willingness to accede to Beijing's conditions for direct talks, including accepting the notion that Taiwan is part of China, set him apart from Tsai, who views the island as a sovereign state.

Han's fortunes began to change after a controversial closed-door meeting with China's powerful Liaison Office in Hong Kong, the first time an elected official had stepped foot in the office. His slide in popularity was exacerbated by his initial response to Hong Kong's pro-democracy protests last June when he claimed -- to widespread incredulity in Taiwan -- to not know much about them.

Tsai, meanwhile, made vocal support for Hong Kong's protesters a key pillar of her ultimately successful re-election campaign.