Three days before the first anniversary of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) presidency, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and other pro-independence groups organized anti-government protests in Taipei and Kaohsiung, followed by a 24-hour sit-in in Taipei.
The Taipei demonstration moved along four different routes, each with a different theme: Protecting sovereignty; protecting Taiwan; protecting the disadvantaged; and combating unemployment.
This placed the focus of the protests on the government’s inability to turn the economy around, while presenting the problem as the result of the government’s pro-China economic policies.
However — and this may have been the result of behind-the-scene assistance from China — between Mother’s Day and the Dragon Boat Festival, the Taiwanese stock market has made gains, temporarily easing some of the complaints from the middle class.
Perhaps because the government is deliberately being vague about the contents of an economic agreement with China, or that it has used domestic opposition as a bargaining chip, but complaints that Taiwan’s sovereignty is being sacrificed — be it through a closer economic partnership arrangement, a comprehensive economic cooperation agreement or an economic cooperation framework agreement — have been handled by Minister of Economic Affairs Yiin Chii-ming (尹啟銘), while Mainland Affairs Council Chairwoman Lai-Shin-yuan (賴幸媛) has made only rare appearances.
The result is that the arguments of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Taiwan Solidarity Union have not gained momentum, forcing them to focus on a referendum.
Likewise, the government has dealt with criticism from non-governmental organizations of the government’s proposed revisions to the revised Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) by saying that the previous DPP government did not oppose the act.
In addition, Ma has personally given instructions that the law must be amended to restrict the discretionary rights of police, thus showing his concern while putting the ball firmly in the legislature’s court and depriving the opposition of an opportunity to further play up the issue.
Furthermore, when DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) made a grand gesture of being ready to risk arrest during the sit-in, she allowed Ma to turn the political spotlight on the issue of public order.
In addition to the DPP’s mobilization of supporters and gradually intensifying resistance, the greatest significance of the anti-Ma protest on his 100th day in office on Aug. 30, the large anti-Ma protest on Oct. 25 and the anti-government protest on May 17 is that they were organized by pro-Taiwanese organizations, which now rival the DPP in strength and have retaken the initiative in social movements.
Although these organizations may have appeared to be competing with the DPP, the detention of former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) seems to have given rise to a compromise between the two, whereby each will follow its own path to avoid putting officials in the south in a difficult situation. When former DPP chairman Yu Shyi-kun traveled south, it was probably to determine how much people there wanted to distance themselves from the DPP.
Thanks to widespread support, Tsai has managed to enlist the assistance of former DPP chairman Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and the party’s former Welfare State Alliance faction. As a result, she no longer has to worry about internal opposition, including occasional annoyances in connection with Chen.
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