Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Lien Chan (連戰) and People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) are determined to visit China. This is the KMT's attempt to reassert control over Taiwan, this time with aid from Beijing.
Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) has denounced this collusion with China and the selling out of the Taiwanese people. This was basically a declaration of war, calling for the people to close ranks against Lien and Soong.
So why should they, as politicians, fly in the face of opinion?
Looked at in the context of Taiwan's history, it is not so difficult to understand. Taiwan has resolved the "historical problem" created by the Chiang family's 50 years of militaristic rule through the exercise of democracy. They have used democracy to counter authoritarianism, and through numerous elections have reduced the KMT's grip on power.
The first step is to declare war on an "alien regime," the second is to break up the political parties that represent it and third, establish Taiwan as an independent entity. This is a long road to travel, and it must be walked one step at a time. The results of the last two presidential elections show that the people's efforts have not been wasted.
The descendants of Chiang family rule -- namely Soong and Lien -- know they have little chance of re-establishing the power of their alien political regime. Their only choice is to sell themselves to China. At its most serious, this is an attempt to use China's power to control Taiwan. At a more egotistical level, they are joining with China to enhance their own political fortunes.
The Chiang family saw Taiwan as a springboard for retaking China. But under the creative shift in direction orchestrated by the KMT and PFP, the springboard now operates in the other direction. By joining with China, the pan-blue camp can throw a spanner in the works of Taiwan's democratization, revenge the destruction of their party and their aspirations. A pilgrimage to China will also diminish Taiwan, thereby diminishing its government. As for the people of Taiwan, as far as the pan-blue camp is concerned, they can go to hell.
The treasonous behavior of Lien and Soong will force the people of Taiwan to take sides. Lee's demand is that we resist the forces that favor China over Taiwan. If Lien and Soong take the bait that China offers, Taiwan will face a clear and present danger. How can the people of Taiwan stand by and do nothing?
Lien and Soong may think they have a done deal, but do they not see that public opinion is arming itself against them? The people will not tolerate China reaching into our backyard, nor will they tolerate an "alien regime" allying with China.
With China's "Anti-Secession" Law and local politicians "joining with China to control Taiwan," what options do the people have? The time has come "to resist the invader and root out traitors."
Chin Heng-wei is editor-in-chief of Contemporary Monthly magazine.
Translated by Ian Bartholomew
In their New York Times bestseller How Democracies Die, Harvard political scientists Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt said that democracies today “may die at the hands not of generals but of elected leaders. Many government efforts to subvert democracy are ‘legal,’ in the sense that they are approved by the legislature or accepted by the courts. They may even be portrayed as efforts to improve democracy — making the judiciary more efficient, combating corruption, or cleaning up the electoral process.” Moreover, the two authors observe that those who denounce such legal threats to democracy are often “dismissed as exaggerating or
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus in the Legislative Yuan has made an internal decision to freeze NT$1.8 billion (US$54.7 million) of the indigenous submarine project’s NT$2 billion budget. This means that up to 90 percent of the budget cannot be utilized. It would only be accessible if the legislature agrees to lift the freeze sometime in the future. However, for Taiwan to construct its own submarines, it must rely on foreign support for several key pieces of equipment and technology. These foreign supporters would also be forced to endure significant pressure, infiltration and influence from Beijing. In other words,
“I compare the Communist Party to my mother,” sings a student at a boarding school in a Tibetan region of China’s Qinghai province. “If faith has a color,” others at a different school sing, “it would surely be Chinese red.” In a major story for the New York Times this month, Chris Buckley wrote about the forced placement of hundreds of thousands of Tibetan children in boarding schools, where many suffer physical and psychological abuse. Separating these children from their families, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) aims to substitute itself for their parents and for their religion. Buckley’s reporting is
As Taiwan’s domestic political crisis deepens, the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) have proposed gutting the country’s national spending, with steep cuts to the critical foreign and defense ministries. While the blue-white coalition alleges that it is merely responding to voters’ concerns about corruption and mismanagement, of which there certainly has been plenty under Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and KMT-led governments, the rationales for their proposed spending cuts lay bare the incoherent foreign policy of the KMT-led coalition. Introduced on the eve of US President Donald Trump’s inauguration, the KMT’s proposed budget is a terrible opening
RSS