Depending on how one looks at it, today could either be the beginning of a new era of trade in the Taiwan Strait or a day of infamy for Taiwan as an independent country. What is already certain is that the entire negotiation process for the economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) was dangerously rushed and, even more important, undemocratic.
The fact that the ECFA was arranged in less than six months, when similar bilateral trade agreements often require years, is in itself worrying. It is doubly so when the bigger party involved does not recognize the existence of the smaller party.
This unprecedented approach to trade negotiations — which did not take place under the WTO umbrella, something that would have ensured that both parties were treated as equals — was also conducted behind closed doors and will be reviewed by a legislature that is almost three-quarters controlled by President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). This is the same legislature that, reviewing previous agreements signed with China, has acted more as a rubber stamp than an actual check on the powers of the executive.
In light of these shortcomings, the two major opposition parties launched referendum initiatives in an attempt to give the public a direct say on a matter of national concern. Both attempts were rejected by the government, on technicalities that, according to some, would have been met with incredulity in other democracies.
Another, and perhaps more relevant, argument against a public referendum on an ECFA is the fact that the majority of the population is ill equipped to pass judgement on such an agreement, because most people do not understand the implications well enough to be given the power to change policy. This argument has some merit, but whose fault is it? How could the population be adequately informed about a trade pact when its content has never been made public? Ignorance imposed on a people because it serves the purposes of a government cannot be accepted as a reasonable argument to deny people the right to vote.
Others could argue that Taiwanese reaped what they sowed when in 2008 they elected a party that has never given up on its dream of unification with China, and that they now have to live with the consequences of that decision. Fair enough, but voters made that choice after years of KMT localization under former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝), who on Saturday came out in strong opposition to the ECFA and Ma. Back in 2008, many Taiwanese bought into the delusion that the KMT faction that was pro-Beijing would not be running the party. Voters could not have imagined that a large share of Ma’s China policy — at least the negotiation part — would be conducted by unelected officials.
Lastly, many Taiwanese who voted for Ma did so because they believed he was the right man to “revive” the economy and improve strained relations with key allies. Never did they think he would propel the nation into a sea of uncertainty by adopting hurried and undemocratic means to shove paradigm-changing cross-strait agreements down people’s throats.
Yes, Taiwanese were perhaps too ignorant, too blind, to be given the power of a referendum and yes their response would consequently be mostly an emotional, if not “irrational” one. But this situation has been deliberately created by government secrecy, and Taiwanese have the right to decide the future of their own country, even if they do so in a purely emotional fashion.
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