The pro-Taiwanese independence Formosa Alliance is to part ways with the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and adopt a new, symbolic turquoise banner, the party said at a commemoration in Taipei yesterday of the 30th anniversary of the death of democracy advocate Deng Nan-jung (鄭南榕).
In 1984, Deng started Freedom Era Weekly (自由時代週刊) to pursue what he called “100 percent freedom of speech.”
In 1988, after publishing a draft “Republic of Taiwan constitution,” he was charged with sedition, after which he went into self-imposed isolation.
Photo: CNA
On April 7, 1989, following 70 days of isolation, he set himself on fire as heavily armed police attempted to break into his office.
In 2016, then-premier Lin Chuan (林全) designated April 7 as Freedom of Speech Day in honor of Deng.
Yesterday’s event drew more than 300 people for musical performances and speakers who shared their memories of Deng, as well as disappointments with the DPP administration.
The party has taken the helm twice, but refrains from telling the world that the nation is “Taiwan,” not “Chinese Taipei,” alliance founder and former Formosa TV chairman Kuo Pei-hung (郭倍宏) said.
The alliance has been urging the government to amend the Referendum Act (公民投票法) to allow referendums on declaring the nation’s independence and changing its name.
The Formosa Alliance plans to adopt turquoise as its color, because the color symbolizes the spirit of the ocean and the land of Taiwan, while differentiating it from the DPP, whose color is green, Kuo said.
“As Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) makes more blatant attempts to annex Taiwan, the DPP administration continues to lead the nation toward a dead end by failing to make the world know that the nation is called ‘Taiwan,’” he said.
Regrettably, today’s young people take freedom of speech for granted, while three decades ago, Deng had to sacrifice his life for it, New Power Party Legislator Hsu Yung-ming (徐永明) said.
Chen Yung-hsin (陳永興), founder of the Chinese-language Taiwan People News, called on the audience — mostly middle-aged or older people — to improve communication with the younger generation.
Many young people support President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) because she promotes marriage equality, but they pay little attention to the issue of rectifying the nation’s name, which should be given equal importance, he added.
Police have detained a Taoyuan couple suspected of over the past two months colluding with human trafficking rings and employment scammers in Southeast Asia to send nearly 100 Taiwanese jobseekers to Cambodia. At a media briefing in Taipei yesterday, the Criminal Investigation Bureau presented items seized from the couple, including alleged victims’ passports, forged COVID-19 vaccination records, mobile phones, bank documents, checks and cash. The man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and his girlfriend, surnamed Tsan (詹), were taken into custody last month, after police at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport stopped four jobseekers from boarding a flight to Phnom Penh, said Dustin Lee (李泱輯),
BILINGUAL PLAN: The 17 educators were recruited under a program that seeks to empower Taiwanese, the envoy to the Philippines said The Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in the Philippines on Thursday hosted a send-off event for the first group of English-language teachers from the country who were recruited for a Ministry of Education-initiated program to advance bilingual education in Taiwan. The 14 teachers and three teaching assistants are part of the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which aims to help find English-language instructors for Taiwan’s public elementary and junior-high schools, the office said. Seventy-seven teachers and 11 teaching assistants from the Philippines have been hired to teach in Taiwan in the coming school year, office data showed. Among the first group is 57-year-old
TRICKED INTO MOVING: Local governments in China do not offer any help, and Taiwanese there must compete with Chinese in an unfamiliar setting, a researcher said Beijing’s incentives for Taiwanese businesspeople to invest in China are only intended to lure them across the Taiwan Strait, after which they receive no real support, an expert said on Sunday. Over the past few years, Beijing has been offering a number of incentives that “benefit Taiwanese in name, while benefiting China in reality,” a cross-strait affairs expert said on condition of anonymity. Strategies such as the “31 incentives” are intended to lure Taiwanese talent, capital and technology to help address China’s economic issues while also furthering its “united front” efforts, they said. Local governments in China do not offer much practical
‘ORDINARY PEOPLE’: A man watching Taiwanese military drills said that there would be nothing anyone could do if the situation escalates in the Taiwan Strait Many people in Taiwan look upon China’s military exercises over the past week with calm resignation, doubting that war is imminent and if anything, feeling pride in their nation’s determination to defend itself. After a visit to Taiwan last week by US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, China has sent ships and aircraft across an unofficial buffer between Taiwan and China’s coast and missiles over Taipei and into waters surrounding the nation since Thursday last week. However, Rosa Chang, proudly watching her son take part in Taiwanese military exercises that included dozens of howitzers firing shells into the Taiwan Strait off
RSS