On the eve of the sale of Next Media Group’s four Taiwanese outlets, a group of university students braved the chilly winds and the cold rain to stage a sit-in protest against “media monsters.” Their request to see Premier Sean Chen (陳冲) was denied. The day before, thousands of workers launched what they called an “autumn struggle” on Ketagalan Boulevard. The Presidential Office merely responded with a short comment.
A month ago, when workers knelt down in front of the Presidential Office to call for help in surviving, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) went to see a movie. In the face of the nation’s various pension programs’ near-bankruptcy, the opposition camp has requested that Ma call a national affairs conference, but instead he held a closed-door meeting with the heads of the Cabinet, Legislative Yuan and Examination Yuan, rebuffing the opposition.
Judging from its reluctance to communicate with workers and the opposition, the Ma administration clearly does not take them too seriously. By comparison, its interaction with China seems to be much closer.
During the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) 18th Party Congress last month, Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) once again emphasized Beijing’s opposition to Taiwanese independence. After the congress, on Nov. 20, former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) immediately met with China’s Taiwan Affairs Office Director Wang Yi (王毅) in China’s Fujian Province, pledging to further deepen exchanges across the Taiwan Strait, push for the establishment of offices on each side and amend the Act Governing Relations between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (台灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例).
This is the dark side of the Ma administration. On the one hand, the KMT and the CCP have cooperated with each other to take control of Taiwan, but they do not care one iota about Taiwanese. The media monopoly, workers’ financial difficulties and national pension programs’ near-bankruptcy are all major issues, but so far, the government has refused to listen to the public or take any action. It even plays dead, showing that it is neither willing nor able to face and resolve these crises.
On the other hand, China is making every effort to annex Taiwan and its opposition to Taiwanese independence has always been consistent, so Hu’s emphasis on Beijing’s opposition to it is something of a non-issue. If the expression “Taiwanese independence” refers to maintaining the “status quo,” meaning the nation’s status as an independent and sovereign country, then that is a “Taiwanese consensus” acceptable to both the ruling and the opposition camps.
However, if it refers to a declaration of independence and the replacement of the Republic of China by a Republic of Taiwan, then that is a change that first has to stand up to the test of mainstream public opinion, as a part of the civic right of choice. Support for or opposition to such change is a question that should be resolved through democratic means.
China opposes Taiwanese independence because it wants to annex the nation. Still the Ma administration would rather join Beijing in its opposition to the public will. That not only jeopardizes Taiwanese democracy, it also causes domestic confusion and confuses the identification of friend from foe, and is likely to push the nation to the brink of disaster.
Ma, as president, represents all Taiwanese. He should have taken good care of their universal interests, but instead has repeatedly shut the door on them.
No wonder that criticizing the president has become a national pastime.
Lu Shih-hsiang is an adviser to the Taipei Times.
Translated by eddy chang
In the first year of his second term, US President Donald Trump continued to shake the foundations of the liberal international order to realize his “America first” policy. However, amid an atmosphere of uncertainty and unpredictability, the Trump administration brought some clarity to its policy toward Taiwan. As expected, bilateral trade emerged as a major priority for the new Trump administration. To secure a favorable trade deal with Taiwan, it adopted a two-pronged strategy: First, Trump accused Taiwan of “stealing” chip business from the US, indicating that if Taipei did not address Washington’s concerns in this strategic sector, it could revisit its Taiwan
The stocks of rare earth companies soared on Monday following news that the Trump administration had taken a 10 percent stake in Oklahoma mining and magnet company USA Rare Earth Inc. Such is the visible benefit enjoyed by the growing number of firms that count Uncle Sam as a shareholder. Yet recent events surrounding perhaps what is the most well-known state-picked champion, Intel Corp, exposed a major unseen cost of the federal government’s unprecedented intervention in private business: the distortion of capital markets that have underpinned US growth and innovation since its founding. Prior to Intel’s Jan. 22 call with analysts
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) challenges and ignores the international rules-based order by violating Taiwanese airspace using a high-flying drone: This incident is a multi-layered challenge, including a lawfare challenge against the First Island Chain, the US, and the world. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) defines lawfare as “controlling the enemy through the law or using the law to constrain the enemy.” Chen Yu-cheng (陳育正), an associate professor at the Graduate Institute of China Military Affairs Studies, at Taiwan’s Fu Hsing Kang College (National Defense University), argues the PLA uses lawfare to create a precedent and a new de facto legal
International debate on Taiwan is obsessed with “invasion countdowns,” framing the cross-strait crisis as a matter of military timetables and political opportunity. However, the seismic political tremors surrounding Central Military Commission (CMC) vice chairman Zhang Youxia (張又俠) suggested that Washington and Taipei are watching the wrong clock. Beijing is constrained not by a lack of capability, but by an acute fear of regime-threatening military failure. The reported sidelining of Zhang — a combat veteran in a largely unbloodied force and long-time loyalist of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) — followed a year of purges within the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA)
RSS