Presidential candidates are treating foreign spouses as “vote ATMs,” protesters said yesterday, calling on foreign spouses to cast invalid presidential ballots unless candidates put forward meaningful policies.
“The policy positions offered by the three presidential candidates are not good enough,” People’s Democratic Front legislative candidate and Taiwan International Family Association regional director Lee Tan-feng (李丹鳳) said.
She slammed Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate Eric Chu (朱立倫) for failing take a stance on immigrant issues.
“You do not really care about the needs of immigrants, because you do not have any polices — all you have done is nominate a ‘flower vase’ to the legislator-at-large list,” she said, referring to Cambodian immigrant Lin Li-chan (林麗蟬), who is fourth on the KMT’s list.
She added that while Lin was on the “safe” list, the lack of any clear policies on immigrant issues made it unclear what the party intended for her to do if she is elected.
She also said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) was “petty” and “abstract” because she only addressed small issues in her policy statements and remained vague.
“Tsai said she would like to increase the use of welfare services by immigrants before they are naturalized, but she failed to state exactly how she would expand access,” she said.
Tsai’s promise to expedite the verification of foreign diplomas would also be of little benefit to most foreign spouses, most of whom work in restaurant and factory jobs that do not require university degrees, Lee said, adding that it was unclear how Tsai’s promise to promote classes in immigrants’ native languages differed from the current policy.
Activists also criticized People First Party (PFP) candidate James Soong (宋楚瑜) for saying that he would treat migrants “as family,” without offering substantial policies — other than a proposal to establish a central government agency that would cooperate with local governments and provide migrants with legal protection.
Lee made her remarks at a protest outside the Central Election Commission with about 20 representatives from the People’s Democratic Front, Taiwan International Family Association, Catholic Scalabrini International Migrant Network and Union of Excluded Immigrants and Unwanted Citizens.
Protesters called for the commission’s official announcement of candidates and their policy proposals to be translated into the native languages of immigrants, as well as for classes to be provided to help them understand policy issues and how to exercise their voting rights.
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