Red and blue strobes flashing from four police cars herald the end to a party at a studio apartment in Linkuang (
The thud of the techno music fades, replaced by the siren sound of police reinforcements. For DJs, party promoters and partygoers, this seems like a return to the martial law era, when there was no freedom of assembly and dancehalls were illegal.
The cause of this police activity -- a pill called MDMA, more commonly known as ecstasy.
Taipei's mayor Ma Ying-jeou (
At the sharp end of the "war on drugs" ironically, is a crackdown against techno venues -- electronic music with a strong and hard-edged beat -- with which many people in authority associate the drug.
Police have already closed down eight of Taipei's 11 better-known clubs that play the music.
Cracking down
On July 22 this year, in a raid that fired the opening shot in Mayor Ma's campaign against MDMA, the Mayor and his police cohorts swooped on China, a dance club on Taipei's Hsinsheng North Road (新生北路). According to a Chinese-language on-line news service, a search of around 250 people in the club revealed 11 marijuana cigarettes, but no MDMA.
Since then, the number of "drug busts" and club closures has increased dramatically. According to police sources, there are an average of three raids a week in the up-market Ta-an (大安) district of Taipei alone. But the government's high-profile campaign has scored some successes.
The old Sex-A-Go-Go (whose Chinese name has undergone many changes and was most recently called Hong Ting) on Hsinhai Road was shut down in July after more than 10 years in business because minors and MDMA were found on the premises. When the club tried to re-open under a new name one month later, the police returned with bulldozers and razed it to the ground.
According to Taiwan law, MDMA is a class 2 controlled substance, placing it in the same category with other moderately dangerous narcotics like marijuana, LSD and amphetamines. It is not considered as dangerous as class 1 controlled substances, like heroin, cocaine and morphine.
-- A conviction for sale or illegal transport of MDMA or other class 2 drugs results in a minimum jail term of 7 years and a maximum jail term of life imprisonment.
-- Ingesting, snorting or injecting MDMA or any other class 2 drugs is a crime and is punishable by a maximum of three years imprisonment. The courts, however, rarely hand down jail time, instead instructing users to enter into state run rehabilitation programs. These generally include periodic drug testing and work according to a "three strikes" system, allowing users three trips through the cycle before resorting to jail terms. So far, no one has gone to jail for using MDMA.
-- Those who seek medical help after ingesting, snorting or injecting MDMA or any other illegal drugs are exempt from prosecution for drug use.
-- At the end of 1998, 45 percent of Taiwan's 38,506 prisoners were serving sentences for drug-related crimes.
In September, an early morning bust at a Taipei bar saw 117 clubbers taken to the station for urine sampling. Twenty-four people were found to have used MDMA and 15 people had used amphetamines.
At the end of last month, a raid on the Boteman pub on Pateh Road turned up 11 pills among the pub's 149 patrons.
But the overall haul, 4.8kg for this year to October compared to 789kg of amphetamine (see table), seems to suggest that the tough measures taken have little to do with MDMA, and everything to do with nightclubs.
Association of ideas
"Mayor Ma has taken an incidental pawn [ecstasy] and is using it [as an excuse] to close down parties," Jimmie Wing, a photographer and party organizer."From the government's position, partying until six or seven in the morning is suspect. They see dance culture as a threat to the stability of society, especially among the youth."
Go Ahead Guya, an English DJ who has been working in Taiwan for 10 years, says the government is closing down techno bars because it doesn't understand dance culture and can't control its influence.
It's a replay of the martial law era, he says. "[Closing the dance clubs] ignores the reality that things have changed ... It's naive to try and stop a world trend. This is what they tried to do in other countries with laws against repetitive beats and so on, but it doesn't work."
Eric Cherng of Image Cloud, a production design company, says cultural values are changing: "People in Taiwan have only just started learning to have fun in the last 15 years. It's different in the West, where you work hard and play hard. Here it is all about your job. Having a party is another matter."
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