When Ma Ying-jeou gave his rival candidate a thrashing in May's presidential election, the Harvard-educated lawyer proved he had the charisma to convince Taiwan's 17m voters that his scandal-scarred Kuomintang party deserved to be in power.
He has retained his celebrity status while the opposition Democratic Progressive party (DPP) licks its wounds after an extended graft trial that sent Chen Shui-bian, Mr Ma's pro-independence predecessor, to prison in September.
But the Chinese nationalist Kuomintang's unexpected loss of five out of 17 provincial mayoral seats in Saturday's local elections must have been a salutary lesson for the president.
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