The administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) is facing its first real crisis since taking office in May last year. Criticism of its mishandling of the disaster created by Typhoon Morakot is coming from every quarter, both from the pan-green camp and traditionally blue villages hit by the catastrophe. The international media, which made Ma its darling, is joining the fray, with CNN International holding a public vote on the question: “Should Taiwan’s leader stand down over delays in aiding typhoon victims?”
In a further sign of media bungling, the Government Information Office (GIO) retracted a request that the Taiwan Foreign Correspondents’ Club instruct correspondents who signed up for a press conference with Ma today to submit their questions to the GIO prior to the media event — which the club adamantly refuses to do.
Amid all the domestic finger-pointing and rising dissatisfaction, another political storm that threatens to buffet Ma is silently brewing across the Taiwan Strait. For the majority of Taiwanese who favor independence and the many who favor the “status quo” over annexation by China, this development might come as a surprise — but as they say, you stand where you sit.
Incredible as it may sound, a growing number of Chinese academics are arguing that Ma is shifting on the “one China” policy he is alleged to be adhering to.
In an op-ed published in the Hong Kong-based Asia Times Online last Tuesday, Jian Junbo (簡軍波), an assistant professor at Fudan University in Shanghai and visiting scholar at Aalborg University in Denmark, wrote that Ma was an “opportunist” who “lack[s] foresight and strategy, with hesitation and self-contradiction manifest in his Mainland policy.”
Jian said that Ma and his aides “have been saying that Beijing should recognize the realities across the Taiwan Strait — that there is the People’s Republic of China [PRC] on the mainland and the [Republic of China] in Taiwan.”
Later, he writes that when we carefully examine his remarks on cross-strait relations, Ma sounds more like former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) — who pushed for state-to-state relations across the Taiwan Strait — than someone who adheres to the so-called “one China” principle. Jian concludes that if Ma is really interested in the public’s best interests, he must realize that world leaders cannot allow themselves to be swayed by public opinion. In other words, Ma should be dictatorial, just like the leadership in Beijing. The op-ed closes with a veiled threat, stating that if Ma makes the mistake of allowing the 23 million Taiwanese to decide their own fate, China’s 1.3 billion people also have a right to decide the future of the Taiwan Strait.
Such articles reflect a growing impatience in elite circles in China as Ma, however much power he wields over the executive and the legislative branches, maneuvers between his policy objectives and the friction that is inherent to a democratic system. His handling of the Morakot disaster will likely make it far more difficult for him to push his China policies, especially at a time when the public trust that allowed him to forge ahead with little opposition has evaporated. As such, Ma may be forced to tread more carefully — and slowly — on his cross-strait policies, which is certain to result in further accusations across the Taiwan Strait that he is wavering, an “opportunist” who cares more about his re-election than achieving unification.
Donald Trump’s return to the White House has offered Taiwan a paradoxical mix of reassurance and risk. Trump’s visceral hostility toward China could reinforce deterrence in the Taiwan Strait. Yet his disdain for alliances and penchant for transactional bargaining threaten to erode what Taiwan needs most: a reliable US commitment. Taiwan’s security depends less on US power than on US reliability, but Trump is undermining the latter. Deterrence without credibility is a hollow shield. Trump’s China policy in his second term has oscillated wildly between confrontation and conciliation. One day, he threatens Beijing with “massive” tariffs and calls China America’s “greatest geopolitical
US President Donald Trump’s seemingly throwaway “Taiwan is Taiwan” statement has been appearing in headlines all over the media. Although it appears to have been made in passing, the comment nevertheless reveals something about Trump’s views and his understanding of Taiwan’s situation. In line with the Taiwan Relations Act, the US and Taiwan enjoy unofficial, but close economic, cultural and national defense ties. They lack official diplomatic relations, but maintain a partnership based on shared democratic values and strategic alignment. Excluding China, Taiwan maintains a level of diplomatic relations, official or otherwise, with many nations worldwide. It can be said that
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) made the astonishing assertion during an interview with Germany’s Deutsche Welle, published on Friday last week, that Russian President Vladimir Putin is not a dictator. She also essentially absolved Putin of blame for initiating the war in Ukraine. Commentators have since listed the reasons that Cheng’s assertion was not only absurd, but bordered on dangerous. Her claim is certainly absurd to the extent that there is no need to discuss the substance of it: It would be far more useful to assess what drove her to make the point and stick so
The central bank has launched a redesign of the New Taiwan dollar banknotes, prompting questions from Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators — “Are we not promoting digital payments? Why spend NT$5 billion on a redesign?” Many assume that cash will disappear in the digital age, but they forget that it represents the ultimate trust in the system. Banknotes do not become obsolete, they do not crash, they cannot be frozen and they leave no record of transactions. They remain the cleanest means of exchange in a free society. In a fully digitized world, every purchase, donation and action leaves behind data.
RSS