The Taipei City Government yesterday removed an advertisement at MRT stations after its content, which referred to China as “inland (內地),” drew public criticism that it showed a lack of national dignity because the term is traditionally used by a colony to refer to its mother country. However, the city government denied that the ad undermined Taiwanese sovereignty.
The ad, designed by the city’s Research, Development and Evaluation Commission to promote Taipei’s international competitiveness, featured an online conversation between two Taiwanese and one Hong Kong resident about the competitiveness of different cities.
The Hong Kong netizen applauded Taipei for ranking 11th in a global city competitiveness survey, saying: “[Taipei’s] ranking was better than all the inland cities on the mainland [referring to China]. Shanghai ranked 38th and Beijing ranked 49th.”
Photo: Su Fang-ho, Taipei Times
While the controversial ads were being removed from MRT stations, the city government denied that the use of the term “inland” was inappropriate.
Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) said the advertisement used the term because it is commonly used by Hong Kong residents, adding that the city government still refers to China as “mainland China.”
“The ad simply adopted the idiomatic expression of people in Hong Kong, and it was a good promotion [of Taipei’s international competitiveness]. Officially, the Taipei City Government refers to China as ‘mainland China,’” Hau said on the sidelines of a sports activity in Taipei when he was questioned by reporters about the advertisement.
Commission head Yuan Nai-juan (袁乃娟) also shrugged off criticism of the use of the term “inland” in describing China, but said the commission would replace it with “mainland China” in an updated version of the ads.
“The ad was simulating a conversation between Taiwanese and Hong Kong netizens, and aimed to show Taipei’s competitiveness in a creative way. The term ‘inland’ is used by Hong Kong people, not the Taipei City Government,” she said.
The commission acknowledged that it has received several complaints from the public, which said the term suggests that Taiwan is part of China. To avoid further controversy, it removed the ads immediately.
Yuan said the commission would change the term to “mainland China” before putting the ads back up at MRT stations next week.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) said Hau should issue a public apology, as the term belittles Taiwanese and is an attempt to pander to China.
Chen said that he had complained earlier this year to Mainland Affairs Council Minister Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) and Ministry of Culture officials about the use of the term “inland.”
“I pointed out that a number of Taiwanese entertainers and singers are using this term when referring to China,” he said. “It is very inappropriate.’
“Some of them are doing shows in China and have to grovel to Chinese authorities,” he said. “Now even Taipei Mayor Hau is using the term. Doesn’t he know the connotation of this term?”
A number of Taipei residents, when reached for comment, said they did not find the term “creative” or “amusing.”
“This advertising is really stupid,” an office worker surnamed Chou (周) said. “We would have only noticed that Taipei lags behind Tokyo, Hong Kong and Singapore in competitiveness. The fact that Taipei beat the cities in mainland China is not a big deal.”
Additional reporting by Chiu Shao-wen
NO RECIPROCITY: Taipei has called for cross-strait group travel to resume fully, but Beijing is only allowing people from its Fujian Province to travel to Matsu, the MAC said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday criticized an announcement by the Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism that it would lift a travel ban to Taiwan only for residents of China’s Fujian Province, saying that the policy does not meet the principles of reciprocity and openness. Chinese Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism Rao Quan (饒權) yesterday morning told a delegation of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers in a meeting in Beijing that the ministry would first allow Fujian residents to visit Lienchiang County (Matsu), adding that they would be able to travel to Taiwan proper directly once express ferry
STUMPED: KMT and TPP lawmakers approved a resolution to suspend the rate hike, which the government said was unavoidable in view of rising global energy costs The Ministry of Economic Affairs yesterday said it has a mandate to raise electricity prices as planned after the legislature passed a non-binding resolution along partisan lines to freeze rates. Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers proposed the resolution to suspend the price hike, which passed by a 59-50 vote. The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) voted with the KMT. Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) of the KMT said the resolution is a mandate for the “immediate suspension of electricity price hikes” and for the Executive Yuan to review its energy policy and propose supplementary measures. A government-organized electricity price evaluation board in March
FAST RELEASE: The council lauded the developer for completing model testing in only four days and releasing a commercial version for use by academia and industry The National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) yesterday released the latest artificial intelligence (AI) language model in traditional Chinese embedded with Taiwanese cultural values. The council launched the Trustworthy AI Dialogue Engine (TAIDE) program in April last year to develop and train traditional Chinese-language models based on LLaMA, the open-source AI language model released by Meta. The program aims to tackle the information bias that is often present in international large-scale language models and take Taiwanese culture and values into consideration, it said. Llama 3-TAIDE-LX-8B-Chat-Alpha1, released yesterday, is the latest large language model in traditional Chinese. It was trained based on Meta’s Llama-3-8B
NOVEL METHODS: The PLA has adopted new approaches and recently conducted three combat readiness drills at night which included aircraft and ships, an official said Taiwan is monitoring China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) exercises for changes in their size or pattern as the nation prepares for president-elect William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration on May 20, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said yesterday. Tsai made the comment at a meeting of the Legislative Yuan’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, in response to Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu’s (王定宇) questions. China continues to employ a carrot-and-stick approach, in which it applies pressure with “gray zone” tactics, while attempting to entice Taiwanese with perks, Tsai said. These actions aim to help Beijing look like it has