In 1996 and 2000 China's threats backfired, giving a decisive boost to Taiwan's pro-independence presidential candidates. This time Beijing officially stayed on the sidelines of the presidential vote and President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) still got re-elected.
China's official Xinhua news agency did not report Taiwan's presidential election outcome until nearly 2am yesterday, about five hours after Taiwan's Central Election Commission had announced the official results.
It ran a brief story entitled "The Election of Leader of the Taiwan Area Triggered Disputes," but the story failed to mention that Chen, whom China has condemned as a separatist, had been re-elected.
The report cited the vote counts for Chen and his running-mate, Vice President Annette Lu (呂秀蓮), as well as for the opposition presidential candidate, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Lien Chan (連戰), and his running-mate, People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜).
The election had gone ahead with "layer upon layer of suspicion," the report said. It also mentioned that the KMT and PFP had asked that all ballot boxes be sealed and that they would appeal to the courts to nullify the election.
The Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) under China's State Council responded to the election and referendum results early yesterday morning.
A TAO spokesman said China "is closely watching the development" of the disputed tally.
"On March 20, the Taiwanese authorities insisted on holding the referendum, attempting to provoke cross-strait relations and split the country. The referendum has been rejected," TAO said in a statement.
"It has been proved that the illegal measure was very unpopular. Any attempts to split Taiwan from China are doomed to fail," the statement said.
Beijing's response to the election and referendum results was in tune with its deliberately quiet tone before the vote, but officials and political analysts have begun discussing the direction of cross-strait relations for the next four years.
Many agreed that Taiwanese identity has grown remarkably during Chen's four years in power.
KMT Legislator Apollo Chen (陳學聖) said he believed the strengthening of Taiwanese nationalism partly came from the public's awareness of pressure from China.
This Taiwanese identity would not have become so strong if the general public did not feel that China was threatening their existence, Apollo Chen said.
The emergence of a Taiwanese nationalism also involves ethnic conflicts as well as confrontations between the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the China-friendly KMT and PFP, he added.
Over the past four years, Beijing has refused to talk to Chen's government. Apollo Chen said that if China continues such policies for the next four years, it would harm cross-strait relations.
"The two sides of the Taiwan Strait will only grow further apart" if cross-strait dialogue remains frozen, he said.
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), which had designed the second referendum question asking people whether they wanted the government to establish a "peace and stability framework" with China, expressed regret over the vote outcome.
The referendum failed to garner the 50 percent voter participation necessary to be considered valid. MAC Vice Chairman Chen Ming-tong (陳明通) called the insufficient voter participation a "procedural" factor leading to the referendum failure.
Chen Ming-tong said the fundamentals of the Chen administration's cross-strait policies are unlikely to change in a second term.
Two major issues raised during the presidential election, he said, were national recognition and reform of the political structure, which included the reduction of the number of legislative seats and the establishment of referendums.
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-wong effective from 5:30pm, while local governments canceled school and work for tomorrow. A land warning is expected to be issued tomorrow morning before it is expected to make landfall on Wednesday, the agency said. Taoyuan, and well as Yilan, Hualien and Penghu counties canceled work and school for tomorrow, as well as mountainous district of Taipei and New Taipei City. For updated information on closures, please visit the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration Web site. As of 5pm today, Fung-wong was about 490km south-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan's southernmost point.
Almost a quarter of volunteer soldiers who signed up from 2021 to last year have sought early discharge, the Legislative Yuan’s Budget Center said in a report. The report said that 12,884 of 52,674 people who volunteered in the period had sought an early exit from the military, returning NT$895.96 million (US$28.86 million) to the government. In 2021, there was a 105.34 percent rise in the volunteer recruitment rate, but the number has steadily declined since then, missing recruitment targets, the Chinese-language United Daily News said, citing the report. In 2021, only 521 volunteers dropped out of the military, the report said, citing
A magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck Kaohsiung at 1pm today, the Central Weather Administration said. The epicenter was in Jiasian District (甲仙), 72.1km north-northeast of Kaohsiung City Hall, at a depth of 7.8km, agency data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effects of a temblor, was highest in Kaohsiung and Tainan, where it measured a 4 on Taiwan's seven-tier intensity scale. It also measured a 3 in parts of Chiayi City, as well as Pingtung, Yunlin and Hualien counties, data showed.
Nearly 5 million people have signed up to receive the government’s NT$10,000 (US$322) universal cash handout since registration opened on Wednesday last week, with deposits expected to begin tomorrow, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. After a staggered sign-up last week — based on the final digit of the applicant’s national ID or Alien Resident Certificate number — online registration is open to all eligible Taiwanese nationals, foreign permanent residents and spouses of Taiwanese nationals. Banks are expected to start issuing deposits from 6pm today, the ministry said. Those who completed registration by yesterday are expected to receive their NT$10,000 tomorrow, National Treasury
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