In a Facebook post on Nov. 14, former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator Chiu Yi (邱毅) questioned the fairness of the controversy surrounding his nomination to be a KMT legislator-at-large, which he felt obliged to withdraw from.
Why is it acceptable to support Taiwanese independence, while supporting unification with China invites vilification, he asked.
Taken solely at face value, his question is a reasonable one. Taiwan is a democratic nation and enjoys freedom of expression.
Both political stances — pro-unification and pro-independence, in their various forms — have support among the electorate, while the KMT has consistently been pro-unification.
His question was answered on Facebook the following day by Li Kan (李戡), the son of author, historian, independent legislator and one-time political prisoner Li Ao (李敖), who died last year.
Li Kan compared his father’s pro-unification stance with Chiu’s.
Li Ao advocated immediate unification and, at different times, spoke for the “one country, two areas” and “one country, two systems” models.
While he cannot be compared to the more controversial inclusions on the KMT’s nominee list, such as retired lieutenant general Wu Sz-huai (吳斯懷), and was certainly no friend of the KMT — or the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), for that matter — he was nevertheless unapologetically pro-unification.
Like Wu and Chiu, Li Ao frequently visited China; unlike Wu and Chiu, he could not be accused of kowtowing to the communists — whether out of “politeness” or not — or of being their toady.
Even when he lauded the achievements of the Chinese communists, as he did in a speech at Peking University in 2005, he also spoke of the importance of free speech and liberty.
To deliver such a speech in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) China today would be a remarkable thing indeed.
Li Kan’s point was that it is not the pro-unification stance itself, it is the way you go about it.
Wu might well have been naive and bumbled his way into listening to a speech by Xi in Beijing in 2016, perhaps not.
On the other hand, Chiu has allowed himself — as has Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference member Ling Yu-shih (凌友詩), a Taiwanese who spoke at the Chinese National People’s Congress in Beijing in March to express her “great anticipation” for Taiwan’s unification with China — to be set up as a communist toady for Xi, Beijing and the “united front” effort to annex Taiwan.
He is the perfect poster boy, the “model Taiwanese compatriot,” for the propaganda efforts of China’s Taiwan Affairs Office.
How much easier Chiu makes life for the office by contributing to the impression, force-fed to the Chinese public by state-affiliated media, that the only thing that prevents Taiwanese from welcoming annexation with open arms is “brainwashing” at the hands of the “corrupt” DPP administration and the “secessionists” it supports.
Li Kan also said that Chiu was guilty of misleading Chinese authorities through his actions and words about the readiness of Taiwanese to accept unification.
This is a stretch too far. Beijing has far more sophisticated ways of amassing that information; it has made an art form of it, and of interfering in Taiwan’s elections and influencing public opinion.
That said, the point stands as to why Chiu has been vilified and his brand of pro-China rhetoric rejected.
Taiwanese can, and should, show the more rationally pro-China voices in the KMT how they feel about them at the ballot box; it is only right that they rail against the more egregious cases of Beijing’s toadies and reject them even before they appear on legislator-at-large nominee lists.
The White House’s decision to take a 9.9 percent stake in Intel Corp is looking like very shrewd business indeed. Since the government bought in at US$20.47 a share last August, the US chipmaker’s surging stock price has delivered the US a US$43 billion return. One of the reasons the investment has so far proved so sound is that the White House has made sure of it. According to The Wall Street Journal, Howard personally pushed deals on Intel’s behalf with some of the most lucrative clients imaginable. They include Nvidia Corp, the company at the heart of the AI
A single photograph can cut through a lot of noise, but it can also be used to misrepresent the truth. At the very least, it can concentrate the mind on something that requires further investigation. On Monday last week, Ma Ying-jeou Foundation CEO Tai Hsia-ling (戴遐齡) and former National Security Council secretary-general King Pu-tsung (金溥聰) held a news conference in which they showed a photograph of former foundation CEO Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭岑), now Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) deputy chairman. In the image Hsiao is seated next to Xiamen Taiwan Businessmen Association chairman Han Ying-huan (韓螢煥). The two men were holding
I first met Professor Ray Jiing (井迎瑞) as a film and documentary student at Shih Hsin University’s (SHU) Department of Radio Television and Film in 1988. The following year, he went on to become the director of the Chinese Taipei Film Archive — forerunner of the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute (TFAI). Over his eight-year tenure, Jiing rescued and restored over 200 classic Taiwanese films. In 1997, he established the Graduate Institute of Studies in Documentary and Film Archiving at Tainan National University of the Arts (TNNUA), and I joined the program in his third cohort of students. Beyond a
A recent report concerning a student who is suing his teacher posed the question in its headline: Does failing a student in two subjects constitute bullying? The college student in Chiayi County apparently sought NT$2 million (US$63,603) in state compensation, but a court dismissed the case. The first reaction of many might have been to ask: What has happened to students nowadays? Some say that teachers have lost their authority, while others say students are overindulged. Some even start reminiscing over the days when “whatever the teacher says goes.” However, the real issue might be overlooked if emotional reactions like that are the
RSS