Although their stances on the independence-versus-unification issue remain generally unchanged, Taiwanese are increasingly concerned about President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) China policy, according to the latest survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC).
The survey was conducted by the National Chengchi University’s Election Study Center from Dec. 5 to Dec. 9 at the request of the council, which has for years monitored public opinion on the current pace of cross-strait exchanges and the independence-unification issue through telephone-based polls.
When asked whether they perceived the current pace of cross-strait exchanges to be too fast, too slow or moderate, a slight majority, or 37.1 percent, of respondents said the pace was just right, while 15.8 percent said it was “too slow.”
However, 36.3 percent of those polled — the highest percentage reported in three years — said the pace was “too rapid,” up about 8 percentage points from August last year.
Meanwhile, a steady decline has been seen in the percentage of respondents saying that the pace is moderate, which stood at about 40 percent in previous surveys.
Some observers have attributed the downward trend to the Ma administration’s perceived arbitrary approach in pushing for the passage of the highly controversial cross-strait service trade agreement it signed on June 21.
The pact, which is still pending approval by the legislature, has been described by opposition lawmakers as a “back-room deal” between the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as only a handful of representatives of the 64 Taiwanese industries affected by the treaty were consulted in advance.
The Ma administration has repeatedly rejected calls from representatives of concerned Taiwanese workers to renegotiate the agreement with China.
Meanwhile, 56.8 percent of respondents said they considered China’s attitude toward Taiwan to be “unfriendly,” the second-highest rate recorded since Ma assumed office in May 2008, compared with only 26.6 percent who thought China was “friendly.”
As for cross-strait relations, only about 11 percent of respondents said they would prefer unification with China, including 2.3 percent who favored immediate unification and 8.3 percent who supported the so-called “status quo” now and unification later.
The mainstream public opinion still leaned toward “the status quo” and “no unification,” as a majority — or 33.7 percent — of respondents wanted to “retain the status quo now and decide either unification or independence later,” followed by those who preferred maintaining the “status quo” permanently (24.1 percent) and those who supported continuing the “status quo” at present and announcing independence in the future (18.5 percent).
About 7 percent of respondents favored immediate independence, while 6.1 percent said they had no opinion.
The survey collected 1,073 valid samples and had a margin of error of 2.99 percentage points.
HASTY PLAN: Instructors must teach in a language they are not fluent in, while students are forced to learn new subjects in a tongue they do not know, teachers said The National Federation of Teachers Unions (NFTU) yesterday urged the government to thoroughly review its Bilingual 2030 policy, saying it has caused problems in elementary and high schools, and might affect the quality of education in other subjects. The government on March 28 changed its original “Bilingual Nation 2030” plan to the “Bilingual 2030” plan, no longer aiming to turn Taiwan into a Mandarin-English bilingual nation by 2030, NFTU president Hou Chun-liang (侯俊良) told a news conference in Taipei. Despite the change, the policy’s budget, resources and most of its content remain the same, causing unusual scenes on campuses, he said. Cheng Chi-yi
‘STILL RISKY’: The quarantine requirement for arrivals cannot be lifted, as COVID-19 cases have been rising in Europe and the US, the minister of health and welfare said The government might consider dropping a negative COVID-19 test result requirement for travelers from low-risk countries, but lifting the quarantine requirement for inbound travelers is still risky, the Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) said yesterday. The CECC on Monday said it does not plan to further loosen border controls soon. National Taiwan University Children’s Hospital superintendent Huang Li-min (黃立民) said the “3+4” quarantine policy separates inbound travelers from family members for only three days, which is not enough to block the spread of the virus, so the government might consider changing it to a “0+7” policy. He also said that it might
Taiwanese singer Miu Chu (朱俐靜) passed away over the weekend after a battle with breast cancer, her family announced yesterday. She was 40 years old. The family wrote on Chu’s Facebook fan page that she died peacefully. “Thank you all for your concern. Miu, who was always full of laughter and always brought people positive energy with her music, left us peacefully on July 3,” the family said. The family asked for privacy at this time and said that details of a memorial service would be announced later. Chu was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2020. She was an alumna of the TV reality show
VIRUS TRACES: Macau is not following international standards, with the WHO saying that COVID-19 cannot be transmitted on packaging, the Council of Agriculture said Macau on Saturday placed a ban on mango imports from a Taiwanese company after traces of the COVID-19 virus were allegedly detected in a shipment, the second such ban in two days. The Macau Municipal Affairs Bureau placed a one-week suspension on the unnamed company’s imports after samples collected from external packaging of its products allegedly tested positive for the nucleic acid of SARS-CoV-2. The batches of mangoes from which the samples were collected have been destroyed, the bureau said, adding that the ban is “aimed at protecting Macau residents instead of targeting specific countries or regions.” However, there is “currently no evidence