One year ago, Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was elected president with 58 percent of the vote. Two months later, his Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) took over the reins of government from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in Taiwan’s second democratic transfer of power. At the time, Ma enjoyed approval rates of more than 70 percent. The figures today look rather different. An opinion poll conducted by Global Views magazine found that only 29 percent of respondents were satisfied with the performance of the Ma administration, while 58 percent were dissatisfied. It is high time the Ma government reviewed its policies.
During his campaign, Ma made his “6-3-3” promise — 6 percent annual economic growth, annual per capita income of US$30,000 by 2016 and unemployment below 3 percent. None of these promises looks remotely achievable. The nation is suffering a severe economic downturn, unemployment is climbing and many workers have been forced to take leave without pay. Despite this huge discrepancy between vision and reality, however, not a word of apology has been heard from Ma, his administration or the KMT.
The US financial storm has swept across the world over the past year, bringing economic turbulence and threatening a repeat of the 1930s Great Depression. People in Europe and the US are spending less, which has had a serious impact on Taiwan’s export-oriented economy. The global nature of the crisis is plain for all to see. However, Taiwan’s performance has been the worst of the four Asian “tiger” economies. This is why people have criticized the government’s competence.
Most of the measures the government has come up with in response to the crisis have been quick fixes, not long-term solutions: consumer vouchers, the Ministry of the Interior’s income support scheme for near-poor families, the Council of Labor Affairs’ “immediate back-to-work scheme,” the free school lunches for all elementary and junior-high school students and so on.
There is the rather belated plan to invest NT$500 billion (US$14.8 billion) in various projects, but the way the government has chosen to allocate this money makes it appear to be a case of subsidizing towns and counties under KMT control, while those ruled by the opposition complain they have been left out.
The government is also too reliant upon China’s goodwill. A year ago, Ma made great promises about how opening direct cross-strait transport links and allowing more Chinese tourists to visit would bring great benefits to Taiwan. However, few if any such benefits have been seen.
Ma called a diplomatic truce with China, but diplomatic relations with allies Paraguay, Panama and El Salvador are hanging by a thread. Then there is the matter of the World Health Assembly (WHA) scheduled for May in Geneva. The government has not announced whether Taiwan will apply to join the WHA as an associate member, as it has in past years, or apply to participate as an observer.
Nevertheless, the biggest failure of the Ma administration is not its China obsession. It is its failure to inform and consult the public. Not once since he came to office has Ma had a face-to-face exchange of views with opposition leaders. He plans to sign an economic cooperation framework agreement with China, but the public has little idea what such a pact would entail. Businesspeople and the public are tired of being left in the dark. Nobody really knows what Ma is trying to do. That is the real reason why his government is so unpopular.
On May 7, 1971, Henry Kissinger planned his first, ultra-secret mission to China and pondered whether it would be better to meet his Chinese interlocutors “in Pakistan where the Pakistanis would tape the meeting — or in China where the Chinese would do the taping.” After a flicker of thought, he decided to have the Chinese do all the tape recording, translating and transcribing. Fortuitously, historians have several thousand pages of verbatim texts of Dr. Kissinger’s negotiations with his Chinese counterparts. Paradoxically, behind the scenes, Chinese stenographers prepared verbatim English language typescripts faster than they could translate and type them
More than 30 years ago when I immigrated to the US, applied for citizenship and took the 100-question civics test, the one part of the naturalization process that left the deepest impression on me was one question on the N-400 form, which asked: “Have you ever been a member of, involved in or in any way associated with any communist or totalitarian party anywhere in the world?” Answering “yes” could lead to the rejection of your application. Some people might try their luck and lie, but if exposed, the consequences could be much worse — a person could be fined,
Xiaomi Corp founder Lei Jun (雷軍) on May 22 made a high-profile announcement, giving online viewers a sneak peek at the company’s first 3-nanometer mobile processor — the Xring O1 chip — and saying it is a breakthrough in China’s chip design history. Although Xiaomi might be capable of designing chips, it lacks the ability to manufacture them. No matter how beautifully planned the blueprints are, if they cannot be mass-produced, they are nothing more than drawings on paper. The truth is that China’s chipmaking efforts are still heavily reliant on the free world — particularly on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing
Keelung Mayor George Hsieh (謝國樑) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) on Tuesday last week apologized over allegations that the former director of the city’s Civil Affairs Department had illegally accessed citizens’ data to assist the KMT in its campaign to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) councilors. Given the public discontent with opposition lawmakers’ disruptive behavior in the legislature, passage of unconstitutional legislation and slashing of the central government’s budget, civic groups have launched a massive campaign to recall KMT lawmakers. The KMT has tried to fight back by initiating campaigns to recall DPP lawmakers, but the petition documents they
RSS