One of the first slogans of the Sunflower movement was: “A 9 percent president should not keep doing as he sees fit.” It was an expression of one of the student-led protesters’ four main demands, which called for a citizens’ constitutional conference to be held because a president with an approval rating of only 9 percent has lost legitimacy to rule.
However, the government is not only suffering from low approval ratings, courts across the nation have ruled against it in many legal cases that have arisen from controversial policies.
These policies include the environmental impact assessments for the proposed third-stage expansion of the Central Taiwan Science Park (中部科學園區), the Miramar Resort Hotel (美麗灣渡假村) in Taitung County, the disputes over land expropriation in Miaoli County’s Dapu Borough (大埔), the use of the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) to bring legal action against members of the Wild Strawberry Movement, the abuse of power and wiretapping to try to revoke Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng’s (王金平) Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) membership, and former prosecutor-general Huang Shih-ming’s (黃世銘) leaking of information on the undue influence probe involving Wang to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).
These cases prove the Ma administration sees the rule of law as a tool for governing the public and that its understanding of the principle places the government above the law. Using the law as a tool of governance while being unwilling to accept the rule of law itself runs counter to the spirit of democracy.
Throughout the Sunflower movement, the Ma administration kept insisting that the occupations of the Legislative Yuan and the Executive Yuan in Taipei were illegal, yet it failed to mention that its treatment of the cross-strait service trade agreement — a major deal — as an administrative order was also illegal.
The government also said that the occupiers damaged public property, but did not mention that its authorization of excessive use of force to remove those who seized the Executive Yuan resulted in bloodshed. These actions irreversibly damaged the spirit of tolerance that should be a part of democratic politics. The way the government abused its position to manipulate the media into using words like “illegal” and “violent” to malign members of the public engaged in non-violent protests is an even clearer example of the damage the government has inflicted on democratic politics.
Ma and Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) used to be academics in the fields of law and politics. As such, they should know that mobilizations such as the Sunflower movement are actions taken by citizens in constitutional democracies when they feel that their democratic system is under threat. Whether such movements are legal and within reason are issues to be dealt with at a constitutional level and not on a criminal level. The idea of “sovereignty of the people” mentioned by the students in the statement they gave when leaving the Legislative Yuan is related to this issue.
The Sunflower movement ended peacefully and represents the start of a new era in constitutionalism and the rule of law in Taiwan. The slogan “A 9 percent president should not keep doing as he sees fit” cannot be repeated enough. Ma must realize that at times, a ruler’s true qualities are revealed by what they fail to do. This means that he cannot keep on doing what he wants.
If the president wants to stand together with Taiwanese and regain his legitimacy to rule, he must stop using court cases as a means of judicial harassment aimed at preventing the younger generation who wish to integrate the spirit of constitutionalism and democracy.
Chu Ping-tzu is an associate professor of Chinese literature at National Tsing Hua University.
Translated by Drew Cameron
The Executive Yuan recently revised a page of its Web site on ethnic groups in Taiwan, replacing the term “Han” (漢族) with “the rest of the population.” The page, which was updated on March 24, describes the composition of Taiwan’s registered households as indigenous (2.5 percent), foreign origin (1.2 percent) and the rest of the population (96.2 percent). The change was picked up by a social media user and amplified by local media, sparking heated discussion over the weekend. The pan-blue and pro-China camp called it a politically motivated desinicization attempt to obscure the Han Chinese ethnicity of most Taiwanese.
On Wednesday last week, the Rossiyskaya Gazeta published an article by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) asserting the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) territorial claim over Taiwan effective 1945, predicated upon instruments such as the 1943 Cairo Declaration and the 1945 Potsdam Proclamation. The article further contended that this de jure and de facto status was subsequently reaffirmed by UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 of 1971. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs promptly issued a statement categorically repudiating these assertions. In addition to the reasons put forward by the ministry, I believe that China’s assertions are open to questions in international
The Legislative Yuan passed an amendment on Friday last week to add four national holidays and make Workers’ Day a national holiday for all sectors — a move referred to as “four plus one.” The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), who used their combined legislative majority to push the bill through its third reading, claim the holidays were chosen based on their inherent significance and social relevance. However, in passing the amendment, they have stuck to the traditional mindset of taking a holiday just for the sake of it, failing to make good use of
As strategic tensions escalate across the vast Indo-Pacific region, Taiwan has emerged as more than a potential flashpoint. It is the fulcrum upon which the credibility of the evolving American-led strategy of integrated deterrence now rests. How the US and regional powers like Japan respond to Taiwan’s defense, and how credible the deterrent against Chinese aggression proves to be, will profoundly shape the Indo-Pacific security architecture for years to come. A successful defense of Taiwan through strengthened deterrence in the Indo-Pacific would enhance the credibility of the US-led alliance system and underpin America’s global preeminence, while a failure of integrated deterrence would
RSS