The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has announced its draft of a transitional justice promotion act, under which a special committee will be established under the Executive Yuan. The committee would have several tasks, including making political documents readily available to the public, removing authoritarian symbols, preserving sites and relics related to injustices visited on the local population, redressing judicial injustices, ensuring that historical truths are revealed once and for all and facilitating reconciliation between different groups and dealing with the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) illicitly obtained assets.
That is all well and good, but framing transitional justice in this way leaves Aboriginal communities’ needs out in the cold. It falls far short of what we would like to see done.
First, the proposed four-fold remit of the committee fails to address the injustices and violations inflicted upon Aborigines by the colonial powers over the years.
Preserving sites and relics related to injustices is a step in the right direction, but it also disregards what some proclaim as “national heroes” and “great generals,” much admired by the Han Chinese for “taming the savages.” Should their statues be removed as well?
I am sure the descendants of those massacred by those “heroes” will feel this to be a good idea, and would be much comforted by such a move.
Another thing is the way in which the KMT’s ill-gotten assets are to be dealt with. The DPP should do more than merely seek to manage the assets, but there is also another issue here. All the Aboriginal properties acquired by the Republic of China government by unjust means after it came to Taiwan should be returned in full to Aborigines.
If the DPP thinks that it is important to manage ill-gotten party assets, it will be just as important to deal with the question of ill-gotten national assets.
In addition, many of the problems that Aborigines are faced with are excluded from the transitional justice that the DPP is trying to accomplish.
For instance, Aborigines were confronted with environmental injustice when the government decided to store nuclear waste on Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼), home of the Tao. Aborigines also face administrative injustice because their freedom to make use of natural resources is restrained. They also repeatedly encounter judicial injustice as the government does not respect Aboriginal cultures and conventions.
I would like to encourage president-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and her new government to not only fulfill her campaign promise to make an official apology to Aborigines when she takes office, but also actively address the issues concerning Aborigines’ transitional justice, namely restoring the historical facts of past injustices inflicted upon them by the colonial powers, investigating the illegal national assets appropriated from Aborigines by the government, establishing harmonious relations between ethnic groups and facilitating reconciliation between the Han Chinese and Aborigines.
Yu Tien-min is an assistant professor at Da-Yeh University.
Translated by Ethan Zhan
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