Late last month, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) nominated Central Election Committee (CEC) Chairman Rai Hau-min (賴浩敏) as the Judicial Yuan president and former National Communications Commission chairman Su Yeong-chin (蘇永欽) as his deputy to promote judicial reform.
The arrangement makes it clear that Ma wants Rai to function as a figurehead, while Su will follow Ma’s orders and take control of the judiciary. However, Ma’s plan could fail this time.
Taiwan was in danger when the UN issued it’s death sentence on the Republic of China (ROC) in 1971. The following year, Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) appointed his son Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) as premier to push for reform. He also promoted several Taiwanese people to figurehead positions at that time. Among the appointees were Tai Yen-hui (戴炎輝), Weng Yueh-sheng (翁岳生) and Chen Shih-jun (陳世榮), three people from the legal field who were often criticized by young lawyers.
DIFFERING VIEWS
Because of a sense of crisis and the divinization by the media monopoly, the younger Chiang came to be known as a reformer. However, then-deputy US ambassador to Taipei William Gleysteen took a different view. After a meeting with 12 young Taiwanese academics, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) members and businesspeople, he found that their views of the younger Chiang seemed to differ from those of the general public.
These young Taiwanese believed the purpose of the younger Chiang’s personnel arrangements were to consolidate power, as he merely recognized that Taiwanese deserved greater participation through tacit agreement.
They were opposed to this kind of empty symbolic reform that made superficial use of Taiwanese, and were determined to organize an effective force to counterbalance the government in the hope that one day, Taiwanese would be able to regain control of Taiwan from the KMT and Mainlanders.
DIFFICULT CHOICE
Ma’s nomination of 71-year-old Rai is reminiscent of the younger Chiang’s methods. What he really wants is to promote Su, not Rai, but if he were to nominate Su directly, Mainlanders would control three of the five yuans if the nomination were approved. Ma thus has no choice but to nominate Rai as a figurehead.
Despite Ma’s arrangement, he may be unaware that Rai was one of the 12 young Taiwanese with whom Gleysteen met.
As Rai is expected to become the new Judicial Yuan president and a grand justice 38 years after his criticism, Taiwanese have the right to expect that he stick to the ideals of his youth and push for judicial reform instead of following in the footsteps of Tai, Weng and Chen and enjoy his remaining years.
The lawyers from Rai’s generation were all deeply aware of Taiwan’s corrupt judicial system. These three major problems — KMT manipulation, government interference and a public practicing bribery — remain unchanged to this day.
Since the KMT led by Ma regained power in 2008, the judiciary has adopted double standards to attack those with different views, and judicial corruption has become even more serious. Rai must face all these problems honestly, and make a brave push for reform.
Given that he had the insight and daring to criticize Chiang Ching-kuo, there is reason to hope that he will not become a figurehead of the Ma administration.
James Wang is a journalist based in Washington.
TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG
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