Lin Yang-kang ( ; 10 June 1927 – 13 April 2013) was a Taiwanese politician. He was born at

Sun Moon Lake Sun Moon Lake (; Thao: ''Zintun'') is a lake in Yuchi Township, Nantou County, Taiwan. It is the largest body of water in Taiwan. The area around the lake is home to the Thao tribe, one of aboriginal tribes of Taiwan. Sun Moon Lake surrou ...

during the Japanese rule of Taiwan. Some thought he might be

Chiang Ching-kuo Chiang Ching-kuo (27 April 1910 – 13 January 1988) was a politician of the Republic of China after its retreat to Taiwan. The eldest and only biological son of former president Chiang Kai-shek, he held numerous posts in the government ...

's successor as head of the

Kuomintang The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Ta ...

(KMT), but after failing to win the KMT's nomination for president in 1996, he became an independent. Lin rejoined the party in 2005, and died in 2013.

Biography

Lin was born in Niitaka District,

Taichū Prefecture was one of the administrative divisions of Japanese Taiwan. The prefecture consisted of modern-day Taichung City, Changhua County and Nantou County. It is also the origin of the name of modern-day Taichung. The Taichū Prefecture was the scene ...

(modern-day

Nantou County Nantou County (; Hokkien POJ: ''Lâm-tâu-koān''; Hakka PFS: ''Nàm-thèu-yen'') is the second largest county of Taiwan by area, located in the central part of the country. It is also the only non-coastal county in Taiwan. Its name derives fro ...

)

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the no ...

and graduated from

National Taiwan University National Taiwan University (NTU; ) is a public research university in Taipei, Taiwan. The university was founded in 1928 during Japanese rule as the seventh of the Imperial Universities. It was named Taihoku Imperial University and served d ...

with a bachelor of science degree. Lin was married to Chen Ho (陳閤) and had one son and three daughters. On 13 April 2013, Lin died at home in Taichung, of intestinal obstruction and organ failure, aged 85.

Political career

Lin began his political career in the 1960s. By 1990, he was a vice-chairman of the

. Aligned with the "non-mainstream faction" that aimed to be less confrontational with the

People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...

than

Lee Teng-hui Lee Teng-hui (; 15 January 192330 July 2020) was a Taiwanese statesman and economist who served as president of the Republic of China (Taiwan), President of the Republic of China (Taiwan) under Constitution of the Republic of China, the 1947 C ...

, Lin tried to replace Lee in the 1990 presidential election, with

Chiang Wei-kuo Chiang Wei-kuo (; 6 October 1916 – 22 September 1997), also known as Wego Chiang, was the adopted son of Republic of China President Chiang Kai-shek, the adoptive brother of President Chiang Ching-kuo, a retired Army general, and an important f ...

as his running mate. He resigned his position as the head of the Judicial Yuan on 1 September 1994 to become a presidential advisor to

. Upon taking the appointment, Lin again declared his candidacy for Taiwan's first direct presidential elections, scheduled for 1996. However, he was not chosen as the Kuomintang nominee. Lin and

Chen Li-an Chen Li-an (; born 22 June 1937 in Qingtian, Zhejiang, Republic of China), sometimes spelled Chen Lu-an, is an electrical engineer, mathematician and former Taiwanese politician. He was the President of the Control Yuan from 1993 to 1995. W ...

resisted calls to join forces and run as the New Party ticket, choosing instead to run separately as independents. After considering

Chang Feng-hsu Chang Feng-hsu (; 5 August 1928 – 1 June 2014) was a Taiwanese politician. Born in Pingtung County, he served on the Taiwan Provincial Council before becoming the Pingtung County Magistrate in 1964. He was elected Mayor of Taipei in 1972, but ...

as a running mate, Lin eventually chose former premier

Hau Pei-tsun Hau Pei-tsun (, 8 August 1919 – 30 March 2020) was a Chinese politician and military officer who was the Premier of the Republic of China (ROC) from 1 June 1990 to 27 February 1993, and the longest-serving Chief of the General Staff of the R ...

, believing that Hau's background might attract more mainlanders' votes for him. However, Lin's pro-China and pro-

reunification A political union is a type of political entity which is composed of, or created from, smaller polities, or the process which achieves this. These smaller polities are usually called federated states and federal territories in a federal governmen ...

views during the Third Taiwan Strait Crisis caused many

Taishang Taishang () are Taiwanese businesspeople who do business in mainland China. The term literally translates into English as "Taiwan Business." There are no official statistics on the number of Taishang working in mainland China. Unofficial estimates ...

to vote against him, and the Lin–Hau ticket finished third with 14.9% of the vote. Chen ran with Wang Ching-feng. Both Chen and Lin were later expelled from the Kuomintang. He retired from political affairs and secluded himself in

Taichung Taichung (, Wade–Giles: ''Tʻai²-chung¹'', pinyin: ''Táizhōng''), officially Taichung City, is a special municipality located in central Taiwan. Taichung has approximately 2.8 million residents and is the second most populous city of T ...

after this defeat. Lin resumed membership in the KMT in 2005.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lin, Yang-kang 1927 births 2013 deaths Mayors of Taipei Kuomintang politicians in Taiwan National Taiwan University alumni Magistrates of Nantou County Taiwanese Ministers of the Interior Taiwanese Presidents of the Judicial Yuan Taiwanese people of Hoklo descent Senior Advisors to President Lee Teng-hui Chairpersons of the Taiwan Provincial Government Independent presidential candidates of Taiwan Expelled members of the Kuomintang