President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) election victory on March 22 gave the people of Taiwan hope that cross-strait relations would improve after he took office. However, over the past seven months, Ma has relied too much on China showing Taiwan goodwill. After only five months in office, it may still be too early to judge the effectiveness of Ma’s cross-strait policies. However, some early signs are very worrying and I hope that Ma can reassess his approach.
In terms of cross-strait interaction, while a consensus was reached on tourist and cargo charter flights during cross-strait negotiations on June 13, the Ma administration showed China its bottom line for negotiations way too early when it said that it hoped to come to a final agreement with China on tourist and cargo charter flights before July 4.
This gave Beijing the power to name the agenda for the negotiations. China subsequently insisted that the issues Taiwan wished to finalize, including cargo chartered flights, increasing the frequency of flights and establishing new routes, be discussed at the next round of negotiations.
On July 18, Taiwan opened up to an increased number of tourists from China. Now, a little more than three months later, only about 200 Chinese tourists visit Taiwan a day. This is lower than the average of 300 Chinese tourists who visited during the last year the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was in power and is far from the 3,000 tourists the Ma administration had promised.
On Sept. 6, Ma said the Chinese government’s refusal to cooperate was the main reason behind the lower-than-expected numbers. Another problem was that Taiwan opened eight airports to the charter flights, but now the only two being used are the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport and the Songshan Airport. This not only suggests sloppy policymaking by the Ma administration, but also political threats from China.
In terms of Ma’s “diplomatic truce,” Beijing reiterated its “one China” policy the day Ma was elected president. China also took action to stop Taiwan becoming an observer at the WHA. At the end of July, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi (楊潔篪) said during a visit to Washington: “No matter what changes occur in cross-strait relations, the ‘one China’ principle will never change.” In terms of the diplomatic truce, the Chinese government is applying the “one China” principle, not the so-called “1992 consensus” and definitely not the “one China, with each side having its own interpretation” proposed by the Ma government.
Although the Ma administration proposed that Taiwan become a member of the specialized agencies of the UN at the end of August, China once again made critical comments, saying that Taiwan was a mere “region” that was “not qualified” to participate in these specialized agencies and that these moves were “an attempt to create “one China and one Taiwan.”
Didn’t Ma tell us that the “1992 consensus” would be able to solve all cross-strait issues? Now the Ma administration’s “survival diplomacy” has been criticized as “an attempt to make one China and one Taiwan.”
A few days after this, Ma gave into Chinese pressure by saying: “The relationship that exists between China and Taiwan is a special one, but that relationship is not one between two countries. It is a non-state-to-state type of relationship.”
This remark legitimized China’s claims that Taiwan is a mere region and not qualified to take part in international organizations. Ma also emphasized that he and Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yulin (陳雲林) would be able to refer to each other as “Mr” during Chen’s visit to Taiwan. Could these actions, which were aimed at denationalization, be what Ma referred to as the “1992 consensus”? I believe that these moves are the result of pressure from Beijing and show that Ma is toeing the line more than ever.
Taiwanese expected cross-strait relations to dramatically improve after Ma was elected. However, right now the public is anxious about Ma’s cross-strait policies. An opinion poll conducted by the Mainland Affairs Council showed there were more respondents who thought that cross-strait relations were changing too quickly compared with those who thought that things were moving too slowly. This is the first time so many people have thought this way in many, many years.
The China Times also conducted an opinion poll that showed more people believed that the Ma administration’s cross-strait policies have damaged Taiwan’s sovereignty compared with those who did not believe this. Amid widespread worry and doubt, the Ma government should reassess its cross-strait strategies instead of stubbornly implementing what it thinks is best for Taiwan, because the results will be devastating.
Tung Chen-yuan is an associate professor at the Graduate Institute of Development Studies at National Chengchi University.
TRANSLATED BY DREW CAMERON
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