Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) members yesterday protested in front of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) headquarters in Taipei against a trip to Beijing by a pan-blue delegation, while KMT members staged a counter-protest.
A delegation of six KMT and two independent officials on Sunday met with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Chairman Yu Zhengsheng (俞正聲) and Taiwan Affairs Office Minister Zhang Zhijun (張志軍) in Beijing.
They discussed tourism policy and trade in agricultural products — and the visitors and their hosts reaffirmed the so-called “1992 consensus,” which refers to a supposed understanding reached during talks in 1992 that Taiwan and China acknowledge that there is “one China,” with each side having its own interpretation of what that means.
Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Taipei Times
Former KMT lawmaker Su Chi (蘇起) in 2006 said that he had made up the term in 2000 when he was head of the Mainland Affairs Council.
TSU members branded the delegation members as “eight blue slaves” who groveled before Beijing and whose actions would confine Taiwan’s tourism industry to a dead end.
“They dared not mention the Republic of China or the ‘different interpretations’ part of the ‘1992 consensus.’ They treated the Beijing government as if it were Taiwan’s central government,” TSU Publicity Department deputy director Chen Chia-lin (陳嘉霖) said.
Since China has extended favorable measures to the cities and counties led by the delegation members, the Executive Yuan should slash the budget of the eight municipalities and direct the money to other cities and counties, Chen said.
These locales should be also excluded from receiving money from the Tourism Bureau’s four-year NT$16.8 billion (US$535.45 million) development fund because they will see a stable inflow of Chinese tourists, Chen said.
“Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) China-friendly administration locked Taiwan’s economy in a dead-end, but the eight mayors and commissioners continue to embrace a dependence on the Chinese market,” TSU Department of Organization director Chang Chao-lin (張兆林) said.
While KMT Chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) said the delegation’s trip was to promote the public’s livelihood, it actually served China’s strategy to divide the public and force President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration to accept the “1992 consensus,” Chang said.
TSU Youth Department deputy director Hsu Ya-chi (許亞齊) said the eight delegation members ignored the impact of low-price Chinese tour groups on Taiwan’s tourism industry and chose to visit Beijing officials while Taiwan was being hit by Typhoon Meranti.
Only a handful of travel operators with a Chinese background benefit from the low-priced tours organized for the Chinese market, while the sheer number of Chinese visitors has overwhelmed Taiwan’s tourism capacity, Hsu said.
The TSU protesters splashed red ink on photographs of the eight delegation members, while KMT members staging a counterprotest shouted slogans against the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
The KMT members held photographs of DPP mayors and county commissioners who have visited China, calling them “eight green slaves.”
It is the DPP central government that has hurt Taiwan through its “unbalanced China policy,” while the pan-blue delegation’s visit to Beijing was aimed at maintaining the nation’s viability, the KMT protesters said.
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