HONG KONG — Taiwan's leader Ma Ying-jeou did something unusual late last month. With the next presidential election almost two years away, he held a televised debate with the leader of the opposition Democratic Progressive Party, Tsai Ing-wen, thereby giving her the status and media exposure she badly wanted.
It was a daring and high-risk move, but he did it because his support ratings were so low that he was having difficulty convincing the electorate that a key economic agreement with China that he has been pushing was in Taiwan's interests.
All indications are he succeeded in pulling it off. According to polling by the United Daily News, on March 18 — two years after his election in a 2008 landslide — his support rating was only 27 percent. Immediately after the April 25 debate, it rose to 38 percent.