Sun Yat-sen’s (孫逸仙) designation as the nation’s “founding father” should be dropped, Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Gao Jyh-peng (高志鵬) said yesterday, pledging to push for legislation to remove the legal requirement that Sun’s portrait be displayed in public buildings.
Gao said that Sun’s title as the nation’s “founding father” is a remnant of one-party rule under the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) authoritarian regime and ran against democratic principles.
Legal mentions of the designation are seen only in connection with the national flag, he said, citing the National Emblem and National Flag of the Republic of China Act (中華民國國徽國旗法) and the Oath Act (宣誓條例).
The National Emblem Act states that the national flag should be placed “above the portrait of the father of the nation” in government buildings, while the Oath Act mandates that officials taking the oath of office should face both the national flag and the “portrait of the father of the nation.”
While the flag is a symbol of the nation whose status is mandated in the Constitution, Sun’s status as “founding father” was crafted by Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) as a tool to justify the legitimacy of his regime, Gao said, questioning why leaders should be obligated to bow before something that has no relation to Taiwan’s modern democratic society.
While requirements mandating that portraits of Chiang and his son, former president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), be displayed in schools were abolished in 2002, the KMT had previously blocked legislation to drop requirements to display Sun’s portrait, Gao said.
Lee Hsiao-feng (李筱峰), a professor at National Taipei University of Education’s Graduate School of Taiwanese Culture, echoed Gao’s proposal, saying that Sun was only designated as the “founding father” in 1940 as part of an executive order intended to whitewash Chiang Kai-shek’s distortion of history and bolster his claim of being Sun’s successor.
While Sun made an undeniable contribution to the 1911 Xinhai Revolution that overthrew the Qing Dynasty, the revolution’s success also depended on many other people, Lee said, adding that Sun should be removed from the “cult of personality” built around him by Chiang Kai-shek.
Earlier this month, Kaohsiung Municipal Senior High School announced it would no longer make its students bow to portraits of Sun and the national flag in its end-of-semester ceremony.
Bowing three times to the flag and Sun’s portrait during school ceremonies has been a tradition for students in elementary, junior-high and high schools.
The school’s principal said the move was not politically motivated, while a student council called it a step toward depoliticizing the campus and achieving transitional justice.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
A wild live dugong was found in Taiwan for the first time in 88 years, after it was accidentally caught by a fisher’s net on Tuesday in Yilan County’s Fenniaolin (粉鳥林). This is the first sighting of the species in Taiwan since 1937, having already been considered “extinct” in the country and considered as “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. A fisher surnamed Chen (陳) went to Fenniaolin to collect the fish in his netting, but instead caught a 3m long, 500kg dugong. The fisher released the animal back into the wild, not realizing it was an endangered species at
The High Prosecutors’ Office yesterday withdrew an appeal against the acquittal of a former bank manager 22 years after his death, marking Taiwan’s first instance of prosecutors rendering posthumous justice to a wrongfully convicted defendant. Chu Ching-en (諸慶恩) — formerly a manager at the Taipei branch of BNP Paribas — was in 1999 accused by Weng Mao-chung (翁茂鍾), then-president of Chia Her Industrial Co, of forging a request for a fixed deposit of US$10 million by I-Hwa Industrial Co, a subsidiary of Chia Her, which was used as collateral. Chu was ruled not guilty in the first trial, but was found guilty
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is maintaining close ties with Beijing, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, hours after a new round of Chinese military drills in the Taiwan Strait began. Political parties in a democracy have a responsibility to be loyal to the nation and defend its sovereignty, DPP spokesman Justin Wu (吳崢) told a news conference in Taipei. His comments came hours after Beijing announced via Chinese state media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command was holding large-scale drills simulating a multi-pronged attack on Taiwan. Contrary to the KMT’s claims that it is staunchly anti-communist, KMT Deputy
RSS