During his visit to Taipei, American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Chairman Raymond Burghardt, an experienced diplomat, cut straight to the heart of the dangers of an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA).
He also expressed US concern for Taiwan’s democratic process. This is nothing if not a slap in the face of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and his lies, misleading comments and plots to integrate Taiwan into China.
Burghardt’s statement that signing an ECFA with China was not a prerequisite for signing free-trade agreements (FTAs) with other countries, together with Beijing’s announcement that it will firmly resist Taiwan’s signing FTAs with China’s diplomatic allies, revealed Ma’s FTA statements as the lies that they are. When addressing the legislative process for handling the ECFA, Burghardt hit the nail on the head by directing his query toward democratic values and the legitimacy of democratic procedure.
This is not unusual. Taiwan joined the WTO to be able to interact with China and deal with trade and customs affairs on an equal footing.
There is nothing that dictates that any bilateral talks should hold priority over other bilateral talks, but when China refused to negotiate within the WTO framework, Ma immediately raised the white flag and began to interact with Beijing based on the Hong Kong model.
The public wants to rein in Ma’s authoritarian behavior by holding a referendum, but with Ma taking his orders from China, his buddies and fellow anti-democrats on the Referendum Review Committee have quashed any such hopes.
By questioning the legislative process, Burghardt highlighted how the rights of the voters to decide the country’s direction, be it in a referendum or through the legislature, have been curtailed.
The always slippery and passive Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) actually told the truth when he expressed regrets that cross-strait agreements cannot be reviewed by the legislature.
In just a few words, he highlighted Ma’s vicious and deliberate attempts to avoid legislative supervision and public referendums. He also revealed that, while fully aware of the legislature’s lack of capabilities, he doesn’t understand the implied negligence of the legislature’s duties.
An ECFA is widely thought to harm Taiwan’s sovereignty, small and medium enterprises and employment, and while the legislature is incapable of supervising the agreement, it doesn’t understand that it can legislate to deal with the problem.
The public has a right to express their will in referendums, but that right has been curtailed by the government and Ma behaves as an authoritarian, deciding that the ECFA must be signed at any cost. How long can the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) legislators close their eyes to this state of affairs?
When Wang, a Taiwanese, joined the KMT, the party’s then-opposition to the Chinese Communist Party met the demands of those Taiwanese who did not want to be annexed by China.
After Ma restored the KMT to power, however, the government has deteriorated to become a local Chinese fiefdom as it follows Beijing’s instructions while avoiding monitoring by and accountability to Taiwanese voters.
All Taiwanese must wake up and realize that supporting the KMT now means selling themselves out and to endorse a mistaken policy that will accept Taiwan’s annexation at the hands of China.
James Wang is a media commentator.
TRANSLATED BY PERRY SVENSSON
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