Amis singer Panai Kusui and other campaigners yesterday planted sprouts of Taiwanese indigenous lilies at the 228 Memorial Park in Taipei to mark International Human Rights Day and the 291st day of their campout for the return of traditional Aboriginal territory.
To protest the government’s regulations over Aboriginal lands, Panai, Bunun singer Nabu Husungan Istanda and other Aborigines have been camping outside the Presidential Office Building for 291 days.
The Council of Indigenous Peoples on Feb. 14 announced guidelines on the delineation of traditional Aboriginal territories that would restrict the application of the “traditional area” label to government-owned land, explicitly excluding private land.
Photo: CNA
The exclusion has sparked heated debate, with campaigners saying that much Aboriginal territory has been privatized and the exclusion would deprive Aborigines of the right to be part of the development of traditional land that was seized and privatized by the Japanese colonial and the Republic of China governments.
The protesters first camped on Taipei’s Ketagalan Boulevard directly in front of the office, but after being driven away by police in June, they moved the camp to the nearby National Taiwan University Hospital MRT station, which borders the 228 Memorial Park.
To mark yesterday’s commemoration, the groups invited members of the public to help plant lilies.
Photo: CNA
The issue of human rights becomes more pressing when Aborigines such as Panai and Nabu are forced to fight for their lands using these methods, Soochow University philosophy professor Chen Jau-hwa (陳瑤華) said, adding that whether Aborigines are objects or subjects of human rights in the government’s policymaking process is unclear.
One hundred pots of sprouting Lilium formosanum (台灣百合) were prepared on site yesterday for participants, activity host Nan Mei-yu (南美瑜) said, adding that the groups hope Aborigines could return to their lands by the time the lilies blossom in spring next year.
In the traditions of the Rukai people, only “innocent girls and brave men can wear lilies as adornments,” Nabu said.
Outside the Aboriginal context, lilies are used to honor people who died in the 228 Massacre and also served as a symbol of the Wild Lily Student Movement in 1990, he added.
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