Siraya activists in Tainan yesterday criticized the government after the Ministry of the Interior (MOI) sent a letter that requested that the Tainan County Government not register Siraya as Aborigines.
The Siraya are a Pingpu — or “plains” — Aboriginal tribe that lived in Tainan County and parts of Chiayi and Kaohsiung counties. Some academics argue that the Makatao Pingpu of Pingtung County are a branch of the Siraya tribe.
The Siraya gradually “disappeared” because of marriage to Han migrants, but some Siraya descendants rediscovered their ethnic identity through unique local religious rituals and historic household registrations from the Japanese colonial period, which recorded each person’s ethnicity.
To help the Siraya re-establish their tribal identity, the Tainan County Government created a Siraya Aboriginal Affairs Committee last year and allowed Siraya in the county to apply to have their Aboriginal status restored at a county level.
“From January to April, more than 10,000 people filed applications based on household registrations from the Japanese colonial period,” Siraya Cultural Association chairwoman Wan Shu-chuan (萬淑娟) said.
However, the Siraya restoration campaign suffered a major setback when the MOI notified the county government on Monday that only those who belong to the 14 officially recognized Aboriginal tribes may be registered as Aborigines, Wan said.
“Before, besides checking the boxes for the 14 officially recognized tribes, you could also check the ‘other’ box when you made a household registration as an Aborigine,” she said. “But that is no longer the case as the MOI has canceled the ‘other’ box.”
Tuan Hung-kun (段洪坤), convener of the Tainan County Alliance of Siraya Communities, called the MOI a “brutal” government body that “intentionally disregards ethnic diversity.”
“We Siraya are here and we are Aborigines. It’s a simple fact,” said Wan Cheng-hsiung, another member of the Siraya Cultural Association.
The MOI issued a press release yesterday afternoon that said any issue related to Aboriginal status was under the jurisdiction of the ministry and the Council of Indigenous Peoples.
“Local governments and household registration offices should not register anyone as an Aborigine without approval from central government,” it said.
The Siraya activists will stage a protest outside the Executive Yuan today.
FAST TRACK? Chinese spouses must renounce their Chinese citizenship and pledge allegiance to Taiwan to gain citizenship, some demonstrators said Opponents and supporters of a bill that would allow Chinese spouses to obtain Taiwanese citizenship in four years instead of six staged protests near the Legislative Yuan in Taipei yesterday morning. Those who oppose the bill proposed by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) demanded that Chinese spouses be granted citizenship only after renouncing their Chinese citizenship, passing a citizenship test and pledging allegiance to Taiwan. The demonstrators, who were protesting at a side entrance to the Legislative Yuan on Jinan Road, were mostly members of the Taiwan Association of University Professors and other organizations advocating Taiwanese independence. Supporters of the bill, led
SILENT MAJORITY: Only 1 percent of Chinese rejected all options but war to annex Taiwan, while one-third viewed war as unacceptable, a university study showed Many Chinese are more concerned with developments inside their country than with seeking unification with Taiwan, al-Jazeera reported on Friday. Although China claims Taiwan as its own territory and has vowed to annex it, by force if necessary, 23-year-old Chinese Shao Hongtian was quoted by al-Jazeera as saying that “hostilities are not the way to bring China and Taiwan together.” “I want unification to happen peacefully,” Shao said. Al-Jazeera said it changed Shao’s name to respect his wish for anonymity. If peaceful unification is not possible, Shao said he would prefer “things to remain as they are,” adding that many of his friends feel
Taiwan has “absolute air superiority” over China in its own airspace, Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) told a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee on Monday, amid concern over whether Taipei could defend itself against a military incursion by Beijing. Po made the remarks in response to a question from Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chiu Chih-wei (邱志偉) on whether Taiwan would have partial or complete air superiority if Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) warplanes were to enter Taiwan’s airspace. Po, a retired pilot, said that the Taiwanese military has “absolute air superiority” over PLA
A shipment of basil pesto imported by Costco Wholesale Taiwan from the US in the middle of last month was intercepted at the border after testing positive for excessive pesticide residue, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said yesterday. Samples taken from a shipment of the Kirkland Signature brand of basil pesto imported by Costco contained 0.1 milligrams per kilogram of ethylene oxide, exceeding the non-detectable limit. Ethylene oxide is a carcinogenic substance that can be used as a pesticide. The 674kg shipment of basil pesto would either be destroyed or returned to its country of origin, as is the procedure for all