A growing number of people are becoming skeptical about the government’s resolve to pursue transitional justice.
Pushing for transitional justice to leave young people a healthy democracy was one of President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) main promises during her presidential campaign and was no doubt a major reason for her victory, as she echoed the public’s yearning for justice and fairness.
However, Tsai and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) have made the public doubt exactly how serious they are about addressing transitional justice and consolidating the nation’s democracy.
A symbolic representation of the party’s commitments is a draft bill for promoting transitional justice, which has been sitting idly in the legislature for more than a year, after it cleared the legislature’s Judiciary and Organic Laws and Statutes Committee in June last year.
“Pushing for transitional justice is one of the most important missions for Taiwan’s democracy,” Tsai said on Facebook on Feb. 26, as she marked the 70th anniversary of the 228 Massacre, adding: “I also hope the draft transitional justice promotion act will clear the legislative floor during the current legislative session … so that we can have an independent agency responsible for promoting transitional justice.”
Tsai’s words might sound reassuring and sincere, but looking back at her promises, one cannot help but note the sharp contrast to what is actually happening. The “current legislative session” Tsai then spoke of has long passed and the fall session, convened on Sept. 22, is to adjourn in little more than one month.
The DPP has repeatedly said that it had marked the transitional justice bill as the caucus’ priority during the fall session, but words that are not followed by concrete actions are just words.
During the Legislative Yuan’s plenary session on Friday last week, the New Power Party sought to place the draft legislation for promoting transitional justice and draft amendments to the Referendum Act (公民投票法) as the first and second items on the meeting’s agenda, but the motion was voted down by the DPP-controlled legislature.
There are only two bills on promoting transitional justice — one from the DPP caucus and another from DPP Legislator Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) — so the DPP in effect scuppered its own proposals to address human-rights abuses perpetrated by the former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) regime under martial law, rectify unjust verdicts and remove symbols of authoritarianism, and to establish a special committee to investigate abuses.
DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) said that passing the legislation is on the caucus’ agenda, but that it “has its own timetable.”
How long does the DPP-controlled legislature intend to wait to pass the bill?
White Terror victim Tsai Kun-lin (蔡焜霖) has said that many of his friends who were politically persecuted have passed away.
Time is running out for victims now in their 80s and 90s who had hoped a DPP government would realize transitional justice, so that justice can be served and their reputations restored, Tsai Kun-lin said.
“Pushing for transitional justice is a necessary step for any democratic nation transitioning from authoritarian rule… It is the government’s responsibility to deal with illegitimate party assets, to uncover the truth about human rights violations and problematic policies enacted during authoritarian rule, and to restore people’s rights,” Presidential Office spokesman Alex Huang (黃重諺) said on the eve of this year’s 228 Memorial Day.
The Taiwanese public now know that Tsai, the DPP and government officials can talk the talk, but when will they prove to the public that they can walk the walk?
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
I have heard people equate the government’s stance on resisting forced unification with China or the conditional reinstatement of the military court system with the rise of the Nazis before World War II. The comparison is absurd. There is no meaningful parallel between the government and Nazi Germany, nor does such a mindset exist within the general public in Taiwan. It is important to remember that the German public bore some responsibility for the horrors of the Holocaust. Post-World War II Germany’s transitional justice efforts were rooted in a national reckoning and introspection. Many Jews were sent to concentration camps not
Deflation in China is persisting, raising growing concerns domestically and internationally. Beijing’s stimulus policies introduced in September last year have largely been short-lived in financial markets and negligible in the real economy. Recent data showing disproportionately low bank loan growth relative to the expansion of the money supply suggest the limited effectiveness of the measures. Many have urged the government to take more decisive action, particularly through fiscal expansion, to avoid a deep deflationary spiral akin to Japan’s experience in the early 1990s. While Beijing’s policy choices remain uncertain, questions abound about the possible endgame for the Chinese economy if no decisive
RSS