The question of who will be Taiwan’s presidential candidates for the election due in January has finally been settled. After a breakdown in last-ditch negotiations between the island’s main opposition leaders to form a joint ticket, there will be a three-way race. Hou Yu-ih of the Nationalist Party, or KMT, and Ko Wen-je of the upstart Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) will run against William Lai, the vice-president and candidate of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Terry Gou, the billionaire founder of Foxconn, a giant electronics-maker, who had campaigned as an independent, has withdrawn.

The question of who will be Taiwan’s presidential candidates for the election due in January has finally been settled. After a breakdown in last-ditch negotiations between the island’s main opposition leaders to form a joint ticket, there will be a three-way race. Hou Yu-ih of the Nationalist Party, or KMT, and Ko Wen-je of the upstart Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) will run against William Lai, the vice-president and candidate of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Terry Gou, the billionaire founder of Foxconn, a giant electronics-maker, who had campaigned as an independent, has withdrawn.

The presidential election, which uses a direct, first-past-the-post system, has the potential to redefine Taiwanese relations with China at a fraught time. In the face of rising Chinese aggression, both opposition parties would adopt a more compromising stance towards the mainland. Both accuse the DPP of endangering Taiwan by being too “anti-China”. The island-state is a small country caught between two superpowers, Mr Ko said in a recent television interview. It must therefore find a “safe balancing point” between them. With polls suggesting a combined opposition ticket would have started in the lead, much had therefore been riding on the negotiations that Mr Hou and Mr Ko launched last week. Surveys conducted between November 20th and 22nd put Mr Lai on 31.5%, Mr Hou on 30.1% and Mr Ko on 26.7%. Yet the negotiations, which were due to be settled by polling data, fell apart over both opposition leaders’ demand to be the top dog.

This culminated on November 23rd in an embarrassingly chaotic and ultimately fruitless live-streamed opposition meeting, less than 24 hours before the deadline for registering candidates. As the deadline loomed, the negotiations ended and Mr Ko and Mr Hou both registered themselves.

Mr Ko, a former mayor of Taipei, chose as his running-mate Cynthia Wu, a TPP legislator and wealthy heiress to the Shin Kong Group, one of Taiwan’s biggest conglomerates. Mr Hou selected Jaw Shaw-kong, a bombastic talk-show host who once founded a pro-unification political party. Mr Jaw is expected to appeal to “deep blue” voters, descendants of mainlanders who fled the mainland with the KMT in the 1940s, many of whom distrust Mr Hou because of his strong Taiwanese roots.

Mr Lai of the DPP had already announced that his running-mate would be Hsiao Bi-Khim, Taiwan’s de facto ambassador to America since 2020. Like several other DPP leaders, Ms Hsiao has been labelled a separatist and sanctioned by China. She is known in Washington as a discreet and capable diplomat. Ms Hsiao has called herself a “cat warrior” in contrast to China’s belligerent “wolf warriors”. Given Taiwan’s perilous geopolitical position, she cautions, every diplomatic step must be taken with feline “caution, at times gently, but also with firmness”.

Despite Mr Lai’s small lead, the race looks tight. Oddly, polls suggest the flurry of chaotic opposition negotiating has modestly bolstered both Mr Hou and Mr Ko. After eight years in power, the DPP is struggling especially with younger voters, who are suffering from high housing costs and low wages. Some also worry about a possible war with China. At a recent rally for Mr Ko, a young supporter named Zoe Chu said she wanted to see Mr Ko elected (whether in a coalition with the KMT or not) to unseat the dpp and reduce tensions across the Taiwan Strait.

Even if the DPP retains the presidency, it is likely to lose its majority in Taiwan’s legislature in concurrent assembly elections. That would make it harder to pass laws against Chinese influence or budgets with increased defence spending. In any event, it is already clear that the question of Taiwan’s posture towards the mainland will dominate the election. Most of Taiwan’s voters appear torn. They want a president who can navigate the next four years of America-China competition, by at once avoiding war and maintaining Taiwanese sovereignty. Now that the question of candidates has been settled, the debate on how to thread that fiendishly tricky needle can begin.

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