The Executive Yuan yesterday designated an agricultural zone within a planned science park expansion in Miaoli in a bid to resolve the Dapu farmland controversy caused by the expropriation of 24 families’ land. The move failed to impress the farmers, who said they just want their own land back.
Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) said the 24 households would be given plots of the same size as their seized land within a 5 hectare reserved zone after the Miaoli County Government completes the seizure process. The government would also help the farmers diversify into organic farming, he said.
“There will be an agricultural zone next to a science park at Jhunan [Township (竹南)],” Wu told a press conference attended by Miaoli County Commissioner Liu Cheng-hung (劉政鴻) and Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Wu-hsiung (陳武雄).
“We reached the conclusion in response to local farmers’ desire to retain land for farming,” Wu said, adding that he hoped the decision would meet the expectations of all concerned.
Liu apologized to the public for the first time at the press conference, saying he had “failed to supervise my subordinates and allowed them to drive excavators in there.”
He did not respond, however, when asked if he should bear political responsibility for the controversy.
“We know that the 24 farming families have suffered great losses. I really didn’t know there were rice paddies there,” Liu said.
Wu and Liu’s comments failed to move farmers’ representatives.
“I will not comment on the proposal because we haven’t seen anything concrete yet, and Liu has lied to us too many times,” Dapu Self-Help Association spokeswoman Yeh Hsiu-tao (葉秀桃) said. “We demand [the county government] gives back our lands, gives back our soil, that they restore everything that was on the land before they destroyed it.”
It took generations of Dapu residents and more than 200 years to turn the once-arid soil into good arable land, Yeh said, adding: “We don’t want to move to another place and start over again.”
What has happened to Dapu was not an isolated case, Yeh said, which is why the farmers were demanding the revision of laws on land expropriation so that no other farmers have to suffer what they are going through now.
Wu’s announcement came after a public outcry over the Miaoli County Government’s expropriation of a total of 28 hectares in Jhunan’s Dapu Borough (大埔). The county sent in excavators to dig up rice paddies despite some farmers’ opposition. Liu said at the time that the county government was acting according to the law and had completed the legal process to transfer land ownership.
Photographs and video clips of the demolitions spread quickly on the Internet and in the media, shining a spotlight on years of campaigning by farmers against land expropriation.
Farmers from Dapu, along with those in Wanbao Borough (灣寶) in Miaoli’s Houlong Township (後龍), Erchongpu (二重埔) in Hsinchu County’s Jhudong Township (竹東), Siangsihliao (相思寮) in Changhua County’s Erlin Township (二林) and Taipei County’s Tucheng (土城) rallied last Saturday on Ketagalan Boulevard to protest land seizures.
Liu Ching-chang (劉慶昌), who led Saturday’s protest, said the government’s offer was unacceptable, and threatened to hold another demonstration.
Wu said he could not promise not to include specific agricultural areas in future development projects, but the government would not take changing the status of these areas for granted when drawing up policy.
Asked what role, if any, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) played in the negotiations between farmers and Liu, Wu said: “The president cares about farmers or he would not have pushed through the Rural Revitalization Act (農村再生條例).”
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY LOA IOK-SIN AND CNA
NATIONAL SECURITY THREAT: An official said that Guan Guan’s comments had gone beyond the threshold of free speech, as she advocated for the destruction of the ROC China-born media influencer Guan Guan’s (關關) residency permit has been revoked for repeatedly posting pro-China content that threatens national security, the National Immigration Agency said yesterday. Guan Guan has said many controversial things in her videos posted to Douyin (抖音), including “the red flag will soon be painted all over Taiwan” and “Taiwan is an inseparable part of China,” while expressing hope for expedited “reunification.” The agency received multiple reports alleging that Guan Guan had advocated for armed reunification last year. After investigating, the agency last month issued a notice requiring her to appear and account for her actions. Guan Guan appeared as required,
A strong cold air mass is expected to arrive tonight, bringing a change in weather and a drop in temperature, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The coldest time would be early on Thursday morning, with temperatures in some areas dipping as low as 8°C, it said. Daytime highs yesterday were 22°C to 24°C in northern and eastern Taiwan, and about 25°C to 28°C in the central and southern regions, it said. However, nighttime lows would dip to about 15°C to 16°C in central and northern Taiwan as well as the northeast, and 17°C to 19°C elsewhere, it said. Tropical Storm Nokaen, currently
‘NATO-PLUS’: ‘Our strategic partners in the Indo-Pacific are facing increasing aggression by the Chinese Communist Party,’ US Representative Rob Wittman said The US House of Representatives on Monday released its version of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, which includes US$1.15 billion to support security cooperation with Taiwan. The omnibus act, covering US$1.2 trillion of spending, allocates US$1 billion for the Taiwan Security Cooperation Initiative, as well as US$150 million for the replacement of defense articles and reimbursement of defense services provided to Taiwan. The fund allocations were based on the US National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2026 that was passed by the US Congress last month and authorized up to US$1 billion to the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency in support of the
PAPERS, PLEASE: The gang exploited the high value of the passports, selling them at inflated prices to Chinese buyers, who would treat them as ‘invisibility cloaks’ The Yilan District Court has handed four members of a syndicate prison terms ranging from one year and two months to two years and two months for their involvement in a scheme to purchase Taiwanese passports and resell them abroad at a massive markup. A Chinese human smuggling syndicate purchased Taiwanese passports through local criminal networks, exploiting the passports’ visa-free travel privileges to turn a profit of more than 20 times the original price, the court said. Such criminal organizations enable people to impersonate Taiwanese when entering and exiting Taiwan and other countries, undermining social order and the credibility of the nation’s
RSS