Former president Ma Ying-yeou’s (馬英九) comment that Taiwan is no longer a free democracy, but an “illiberal democracy” was opposed by 66.6 percent of respondents to a survey released yesterday by the Asia-Pacific Elite Interchange Association.
A breakdown of the results showed that, at 76.5 percent, respondents aged 20 to 29 disagreed most with his comment, which was made in a letter published on Thursday in the Chinese-language United Daily News.
Ma’s opinion piece, titled “Taiwan is now an ‘illiberal democracy,’” said that actions taken by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration have made Taiwan deviate further from being a free democracy, adding that President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has frequently touted the “preciousness of Taiwan’s democratic values,” while at the same time, “she has personally destroyed them.”
Photo: Lin Cheng-kun, Taipei Times
The results showed that 68.9 percent of respondents agreed that Taiwan is among the leading countries with democratic political institutions — the highest agreement was among those aged 20 to 29, followed by those aged 30 to 39.
“The older the age group, the higher the percentage of those who disagreed that Taiwan is a free democracy,” said DPP Legislator Lo Chih-cheng (羅致政), who is an association member.
The survey also asked about the US not inviting China to US President Joe Biden’s Summit for Democracy, with 69.4 percent of respondents saying that Washington was right not to invite Beijing, agreeing that it is a communist, authoritarian regime and has committed human rights violations.
Asked about a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics, 45.5 percent of respondents agreed that Taiwan should follow in the footsteps of the US, the UK and Australia, while 37.3 percent said they opposed a boycott.
Regarding Nicaragua severing diplomatic ties with Taiwan, 27.1 percent of respondents believed China was most responsible, while 11.3 percent held that Taiwan was the most responsible.
Asked if “Beijing picked the Summit for Democracy as the time for Nicaragua to sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan to challenge its democratic values,” 52.9 percent of respondents agreed, while 32.8 percent disagreed, National Taiwan Normal University political studies professor Fan Shih-ping (范世平) said.
The survey, which the association conducted from Friday to Sunday, collected 1,073 valid responses and has a margin of error of 2.97 percentage points.
Additional reporting by Jason Pan
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