After taking up his new post last month, Minister of Education Yeh Jiunn-rong (葉俊榮) asked National Taiwan University’s (NTU) presidential election committee to restart its selection process. Perhaps most people view the government’s disapproval of NTU president-elect Kuan Chung-ming (管中閔) as an educational or legal issue, but it is also a matter of national security.
NTU plays a leading role in Taiwanese academia. As the cradle for the nation’s best talent and technology research, the university receives a huge amount of funding. Most of the resources provided by the government allow the school to engage in a variety of research projects and cultivate outstanding talent.
The controversy over Kuan is about more than his breach of the school’s regulation that professors cannot concurrently hold off-campus positions.
During the selection process, Taiwan Mobile vice chairman Richard Tsai (蔡明興) did not recuse himself from the presidential selection committee, although Kuan worked as an independent director on the company’s board.
Even more worrying are Kuan’s connections with China.
Xiamen University (XMU) plays a key role in China’s “united front” work against Taiwan. In a 2009 article, XMU president Zhu Chongshi (朱崇實) said that the school’s Taiwan “research” — read “intelligence gathering” — won the Chinese government’s praise, and that it had employed Kuan and more than 30 Taiwanese academics and politically influential people as full-time or part-time professors.
He said the school tried to attract Taiwanese students through exchanges with more than 20 Taiwanese universities, recruiting more than 800 Taiwanese students.
The school was doing so to better “serve the unification of the motherland,” Zhu said.
When this was first exposed, XMU said that Kuan gave lectures at the school. After the controversy grew, the school covered for him, making their close connection self-evident.
There have also been reports that Kuan facilitated cooperation between the school and Fubon Financial Holding Co.
The university is now the bank’s main school partner in China, and they have organized events together, such as the Forum on the Economic Zone on the West Coast of the Taiwan Straits and the Cross-Strait Financial Research Conference. They have also established the Fubon Center for Cross-Straits Finance and Industry, Xiamen University.
When attending a forum organized by XMU, Tsai, who serves concurrently as chairman of Fubon, said the company wants to be a pioneer in cross-strait financial cooperation and pledged to use China’s Fujian Province, where the university is located, as a starting point to grow across the country.
It is obvious that the company is using the school as a foothold for its expansion into China. It is also obvious that there is more to the relationship between Tsai and Kuan, since Kuan is playing an important role in Tsai’s business strategy in China.
Looking at XMU’s strong “united front” goal of better serving the “unification of the motherland,” one cannot help but wonder if Kuan’s nomination as NTU president, being the result of support from a company with close Chinese connections, means that he would create a channel for pro-communist forces to enter Taiwan’s top university.
The US has raised the alarm, as China has stolen US technologies, and reports about Chinese technology theft from Taiwanese companies are frequent.
Since NTU is the biggest recipient of government resources for research, there is a risk that the infiltration of communist forces would result in an outflow of top talent and technology. This is a security issue that the government must face head-on.
Feng Yi-ping is a doctoral student.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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