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Editorial: Beijing keeps its blinders on

After four days of silence, Beijing finally commented yesterday on the outcome of Saturday's elections. The remarks from Zhang Mingqing (張銘清), spokesman of the Taiwan Affairs Office of China's State Council, have shown once again that politicians raised in a communist system do not understand democracy. They do not understand the power of votes and public opinion. Zhang's bizarre remarks were an attempt by the Chinese leadership to twist public opinion in Taiwan on the basis of their own stereotypes.

Since Saturday, this newspaper and foreign media around the world have called on China to squarely face the results of Taiwan's elections and open the door to negotiations with the DPP government. But the leaders in Zhongnanhai have failed to heed the advice.

The DPP will be the biggest party in the legislature next year, but Zhang insisted that China will not have any dealings with the DPP as long as it does not amend the independence clause in its party charter, toe the "one China" line and accept the "1992 consensus." Zhang's remarks were a clear signal to the international community that what China will only accept is Taiwan's surrender, not dialogue. Beijing will continue to turn a blind eye to all the goodwill gestures made by Taipei. Once again, the Beijing authorities have shown that they are the stumbling block to the development of cross-strait relations, not Taiwan.

But while unable to comprehend public opinion in Taiwan, China has proven to be quite capable of putting a spin on it. Without quoting figures or sources, Zhang said that public support in Taiwan for "one country, two systems" is on the rise. He must have gotten that impression from an old opinion poll conducted by the pro-unification media -- Saturday's elections clearly showed just the opposite. Ultra-unificationist Elmer Fung (馮滬祥) and many others from the New Party were dumped by voters. The KMT, which accepts "one China" and the "1992 consensus," suffered a major setback.

Opinion polls in Taiwan, especially around election time, are both biased and highly speculative -- not to mention the fact that no poll has ever shown mainstream public opinion accepting "one country, two systems." The people of Taiwan prefer to say what they think where it counts -- at the ballot box. The message from the electorate was clear: they oppose hasty unification and "one China" and they want stability and progress.

At yesterday's Executive Yuan meeting, Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) stressed that most voters reject "one country, two systems" and that he hopes the Chinese authorities can understand Taiwan's real mainstream opinion -- something they have been unable to do thus far.

China wants to deal with political parties in Taiwan that are willing to surrender to Beijing. China hopes that Taiwan's political and social climate will change from opposing "one China" to accepting it. They might as well try and grow new shoots on a petrified tree. Chinese leaders only meet with and listen to those politicians from Taiwan who are willing to bow to them -- so all they hear is what they want to hear. As a result, they have seriously misjudged the situation in Taiwan. Even though almost all of their policies have backfired, they remain unwilling to accept reality.

Saturday's elections were a clear slap in the face to China. Perhaps now the leadership in Zhongnanhai will understand that politicians who pay more attention to Beijing than they do their own constituencies do not represent mainstream opinion in Taiwan and in fact are hated by many voters. Beijing's leadership should understand that they must deal with a united people -- not any individual politician nor party. If they insist on living in their little fantasy world, they will forever be disappointed.
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