An opinion poll released yesterday found that support for independence has fallen to its lowest level in three years, despite a majority of Taiwanese remaining opposed to unification with China.
Forty-four percent of respondents supported Taiwan’s eventual independence, the lowest figure since December 2009 and a drop of more than 10 percentage points from the 55.4 percent recorded in a poll conducted in August last year, according to Taiwan Indicators Survey Research (TISR).
Meanwhile, opposition to independence appeared to be gaining support, with 37.4 percent of those polled saying they did not support independence — the highest number since February 2006, when the polling institute began conducting surveys on the public’s views on cross-strait relations.
“The reasons behind the sudden change are unclear, but we believe it could be related to several visits to China by Democratic Progressive Party [DPP] politicians to promote closer bilateral ties,” TISR general manager Tai Li-an (戴立安) said in a press release.
Support rates for eventual independence have ranged between 42.1 percent and 51.4 percent in the 11 polls TISR has conducted between February 2006 and September 2011, before the record-high of 55.4 percent in August last year and the sudden slide in the latest poll, TISR data showed.
Support for eventual unification with China has not increased, with 63.6 percent opposing such a move.
However, the support rate for unification, 20.9 percent, was also at its highest since November 2008.
The survey also asked respondents for their general impression of the People’s Republic of China and found that a majority of them agreed with six of eight descriptions.
More than 60 percent of respondents viewed China as “powerful” and “successful,” but, at the same time, “unpredictable, untrustworthy, threatening and ‘different from us,’” the survey found.
Respondents were split on whether China adopts a defensive/offensive-oriented strategy and whether China is a willing partner.
President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) approval rating was 18.2 percent, down 0.2 percent from earlier last month, while his disapproval rating remained at 71.3 percent, according to the survey.
The poll, which was conducted between Monday and Tuesday, collected 1,008 valid samples with a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.
Taiwan might be China’s next target after it has “walled off” Hong Kong from the rest of the world with its new national security legislation, Academia Sinica Institute of Sociology fellow Wu Jieh-min (吳介民) said on Thursday. At a seminar organized by the Economic Democracy Union, the Taiwan Association for Human Rights, the Hong Kong Outlanders and the Judicial Reform Foundation, Wu said that the legislation is simultaneously a fig leaf concealing Beijing’s autocratic rule in Hong Kong and a figurative “Berlin Wall,” denying democratic countries access to Hong Kong. Wu said it is evident that Taiwan would be China’s next target. The
SAFETY CONCERNS: A construction company working nearby admitted to negligence in the incident, and is to pay a fine and other expenses related to damages Residents of homes adjacent to an alleyway in New Taipei City’s Yonghe District (永和) on Saturday were forced to evacuate their homes after the road collapsed, the New Taipei City government said yesterday. An 80m by 4m area in an alleyway on Wenhua Road (文化路) collapsed at 10:39am near an apartment building construction site where work was being done on the project’s foundation. The incident also ruptured an underground gas pipe and tilted several buildings in the area. Residents would not be able to return to their homes until tomorrow or Wednesday, when repairs are expected to be finished, the city government said. Workers
CHALLENGER DEEP: Lin Ying-Tsong was invited by Caladan Oceanic founder Victor Vescovo to join him on a 10-hour long trip in the company’s submersible Taiwanese-American Lin Ying-Tsong (林穎聰) last month became the first person from Asia and the 12th in human history to dive into the deepest part on Earth, the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench. Lin, 45, an expert in deep sea acoustics with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Massachusetts, joined US adventurer and Caladan Oceanic founder Victor Vescovo, 54, on June 22 in a descent to the central pool of the Challenger Deep, the deepest point of the trench, which lies at a depth of more than 10,900m. The pair made the descent in a submersible named Limiting Factor, a US$37
ARMS RACE: Two DPP lawmakers said that China’s development model differed from Taiwan’s, as it aims to become a global hegemon, while Taiwan seeks to protect itself Taiwanese national defense experts are split on how Taiwan should respond to the ever-growing budget of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA), with some advocating for Taiwan to increase defense spending, while others say that little can be done. The Legislative Yuan approved NT$358 billion (US$12.1 billion) for national defense spending across fiscal 2020, a 3.47 percent increase compared with last year, while China’s military budget this year is NT$5.4 trillion, more than 15 times that of Taiwan. Regardless of whether the government adopts a zero-based budgeting method for national defense spending — in which all expenses are justified and approved each
RSS