On Sept. 21, Zogby International released the results of a US telephone poll commissioned by the Government Information Office (GIO). According to the poll, 55 percent of Americans believe "the UN should offer Taiwan membership." If Taiwan passes a referendum supporting a UN bid, 70 percent of the respondents said that "the US should not oppose the island nation's petition to join." This is exciting.
Although the outcome of this kind of referendum is not legally binding, public opinion at home will put pressure on Washington to improve its treatment of Taiwan.
This is reminiscent of when former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) -- after being humiliated during a stopover in Hawaii -- won strong US public support that later forced then US president Bill Clinton to approve Lee's visit to Cornell University.
We should pay greater attention to whether the referendums proposed by the pan-blue and pan-green camps can be passed and whether they should be combined.
Extremists in the pan-blue camp oppose combining the referendums because they believe the two sides of the Taiwan Strait belong to "one China." They also think that since China already has a UN seat, Taiwan should not apply for membership because that would create "two Chinas" or "one China, one Taiwan." Thus, they hope the referendums will fail.
Similarly, pan-green fundamentalists oppose combining the referendums because they believe the two camps are different, as are their referendum proposals.
Referendum supporters think that if the total number of voters for the two referendums exceeds half of the total number of eligible voters, they can proclaim to the international community that the referendum supporting Taiwan's UN bid is passed.
Indeed, if neither referendum is passed on its own, this will be the only way to promote the result, but it would undoubtedly be very difficult to convince the world to accept such a claim.
The problem with such creative ballot counting is that the international community has always been controlled by power politics.
The rules of the game have been dominated by the leading powers and creativity has always been their privilege. It seems very difficult for a tiny country like Taiwan, which is often blocked even when playing by the rules, to have everyone accept its innovations.
Furthermore, China's international propaganda machine is much stronger than Taiwan's. Once Beijing points out that both referendums have failed, it will be difficult to make the world listen to Taiwan and not China.
If turnout for the presidential election is 75 percent, and if one third of pro-blue supporters do not vote in the referendums, it is question-able whether the number of people voting in the referendums will exceed half of the total number of eligible voters.
The pan-green camp has attacked the blue camp's proposal of "rejoining" the UN, rather than "joining," as fundamentally unfeasible.
If Taiwan wants to add the voters from one referendum to the voters in the other referendum it will be hard put to justify this to the international community.
The harm caused by two failed referendums would be enormous and the benefits if they pass are shown in the poll. Hence, the ruling and opposition parties must take immediate steps to remedy the situation for the sake of the country.
Lin Cho-shui is a former Democratic Progressive Party legislator.
TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG
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