For Vice President Annette Lu (
As the early contest for the 2008 presidential election heats up, Lu is the only contender to persistently take a solid stance in pursuing her agenda.
Last year, Lu demonstrated particular devotion to pursuing her ideals. To solidify the nation's diplomatic ties, she conducted two overseas trips -- to Central America in March and Palau in June. In August, Lu formally established the Democratic Pacific Union (DPU), composed of 28 member states, and became its first director-general. Under her guidance, several academic exchanges have been conducted and the DPU's Pacific Center for Disaster Reduction was established last month.
PHOTO: LIU HSIN-DE, TAIPEI TIMES
"United Nations [membership] is now not our only goal. We have new channels, including the DPU, to publicize Taiwan's valuable experience in promoting universal values, including democracy and human rights," Lu told the Taipei Times during an exclusive interview.
For decades, Taiwan's leading female political figure has seized any opportunity to campaign for the nation's return to the UN.
However, based on past experience, she knows clearly that China's barriers are not easy to remove.
Soft power
"Taiwan is now using the `soft power' of its existing advantages in various fields to strengthen relations not only with friendly countries but also other influential countries with which it has no diplomatic ties. It's more practical for Taiwan to explore international space in this way," Lu said.
Lu knows from personal experience the importance of human rights. She spent 64 months behind bars after making a 20-minute speech that criticized the government at a peaceful rally commemorating International Human Rights Day in Kaohsiung in 1979. But Lu has transformed the humiliation of that episode into a driving force in her fight for social justice.
Since May 2000, when she became Taiwan's first female vice president, Lu has used her political influence to promote the value of human rights.
The Human Rights Advisory Committee, convened by Lu, has been the most active of the committees and taskforces under the Presidential Office. Over the past five years, the committee has reviewed controversies surrounding the government's plans to build a fingerprint database of every person in Taiwan, the lack of laws regulating firms that threaten debtors with violence and problems involving Chinese smugglers.
In addition, as a legal specialist, Lu has called for revolutionary reforms in the training of law enforcement officials.
"We need judges that have abundant social experience. Currently, some diligent law students can easily pass examinations and become judges without experiencing real life. The situation might not be positive for the public," Lu said.
Lu said that through amendments, new regulations that ensure the quality of the nation's legal officials might be available by 2010.
High ideals
Lu's loyalty to her high social justice ideals makes her different from other key figures inside the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Late last year, when the party was under the shadow of a scandal involving the construction of the Kaohsiung Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system, Lu decided to help establish a citizen's alliance to oversee construction. While some party members criticized her for highlighting the party's shortcomings, Lu insisted that the monitoring mechanism would guard the human rights of Kaohsiung's residents.
"I'm sure that volunteer experts that form the monitoring group will further ensure the quality of the construction," Lu said.
Last November, Lu focused on a controversy regarding freedom of speech that was triggered by a VCD made to criticize the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) candidates in local elections. Lu said that inappropriate measures used by law enforcement officials could reverse Taiwan's democratic development.
While the case slipped out of the public's attention after the elections were over, Lu convened a public hearing on it at the Presidential Office and invited victims to speak about the case.
Budget cuts
Lu said that the Legislative Yuan's recent proposal calling on the Presidential Office to dissolve certain groups, including the human rights committee, filled her with regret.
"Our doing many things to protect human rights from being damaged consumes not a penny of the budget allocated regularly for the Presidential Office. If the committee had never existed, more incidents jeopardizing human rights might have occurred," Lu said.
The legislature last week passed a People First Party proposal requiring the Presidential Office dissolve several agencies, including those convened by Lu.
"Obviously, legislators from the opposition know little about what we have achieved. KMT Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (
According to Lu, special reports about the achievements of the human rights committee and the Presidential Office's Advisory Council for Science and Technology will be published by May 20 to make their efforts known to the public. In addition, a new biography of Lu, being written for a prominent foreign publisher, is expected to be available in two languages in several countries. Her last biography, in Chinese, was published in early 1996, when she hoped to become a candidate for vice president.
"Those who think about the presidential election in 2008 all the time might eventually become marginalized. In my new biography, I do not talk about my personal career goals regarding 2008 at all. However, `doing things' and `being prepared' are my principles," Lu said.
DPP affairs
Meanwhile, Lu's other trailblazing role in the post of acting DPP chair over the past month has also prompted many to re-evaluate her.
As soon as she decided to stay on as acting chairwoman -- after internal opposition to her taking the post was mitigated -- Lu immediately held individual meetings with the directors of party departments to hear their opinions. Lu impressed the party with her activism and grasp of party affairs. She has proposed several new ideas for the DPP's development.
For example, in terms of facilities such as the DPP's headquarters, Lu said she noticed the building's rent was a heavy financial burden.
"If the DPP could pool about NT$10 million [US$314,000] to make a deal with the landlord and buy the building, we could save some NT$400 million in rent over the next 30 years," Lu said.
"Small changes can make things different," Lu said. "I can only say that the previous chairmen were too busy to notice this problem."
Lu's outspokenness wins her praise, but also blame. However, she has already survived many personal attacks, and continues to break new ground for her party.
"This is the way I do things -- to be what you are," Lu said. "I have mostly pointed out the DPP's problems over the last month."
"And my comments on the three chairperson candidates were only objective descriptions. I don't see why there would be an overreaction to my comments unless they were to the point," Lu said, in reaction to the protests of some candidates after Lu's comments last Thursday.
New DPP chair
Lu also offered her suggestions on the tasks that the new DPP chair will face, saying that this person will have to handle a significant number of election-related matters in this coming year -- including some they might not have expected when they decided to run for the position.
"What's coming up is no fun at all," Lu said. "It will require a lot of responsibility."
This year, there will be eight elections that the new DPP leader will have to handle, including a by-election to choose a new Chaiyi City legislator, the Taipei and Kaohsiung mayoral elections and the primaries for the 2007 legislative election.
"One of the crucial tasks for the new leader is to lead the DPP to create victory out of defeat in the next elections," Lu said.
"The biggest goals for a political party are to win elections, campaign for candidates and get them elected. Therefore, the duty of a governing party is to build up its social and political image, recruit the best talent to join the party and recommend the most competent candidate to voters in every election," she said.
"Leading the government using the party's aims is an obsolete way of thinking that the KMT has held on to, and we cannot turn back the wheel of the history." Lu said. "I think that assisting the government through the party's efforts is a better way to view [the party's role]."
Women in politics
As an early champion of women's rights movement in Taiwan, Lu said that she has paid special attention to women's right to participate in politics and will continue to contribute to this field.
"The era of women's participation in politics has arrived," she said. "I think we should increase the chances and space, to allow women to bring their abilities into full play."
In the past, most female legislators or city councilors came from the KMT's Huang Fu-hsing (黃復興) branch, a special party branch whose members include military veterans and their family members. This was because soldiers are prohibited from participating in politics, Lu said.
"But it is a thing of the past that women are dependent on men. Female candidates should not be someone else's wives or daughters any longer," Lu said.
Given that a new electoral system will be adopted that will require political parties to have at least 50 percent of their legislators-at-large be female, the DPP should be prepared for this new system and develop excellent women to work for the people, she said.
Although women account for about 38 percent of the DPP's membership -- which is far beyond the the KMT's ratio -- it still has room to improve, Lu said.
"I think the DPP should be more active and positive to invite outstanding women to enter the DPP," Lu said, adding that she has told the party's department of women's development to work on this.
But Lu did not extend this feminist attitude to the election for party chairperson, saying that overemphasizing gender issues would cause "reverse discrimination."
"In an election where there is only one seat, the candidate's quality matters more than gender," she said.
"We expect the ceiling to be raised to help promote women, but I don't think it is good to replace male chauvinism with another form of repression," she said.
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