According to a recent poll, Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (
Soon after Ma became the chairman of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), he sold some "KMT assets" which are considered national assets by many people. Before this dispute on ownership is settled, he has already put hundreds of millions of US dollars into KMT bank accounts that can be used to finance his 2008 presidential election campaign.
A few years ago, a Harvard alumnus openly accused Ma of being one of the spies monitoring and reporting "dissident" activities and remarks made by overseas Taiwanese students to the KMT totalitarian regime during the "white terror" era. Many students were blacklisted and were not allowed to go back to their own homeland.
Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) nominated Ma to run for the mayor of Taipei as "a new Taiwanese." However, Mayor Ma has acted more like "a new Chinese" -- praising China's freedom, flying China's flag and banning Taiwan's own flag, adopting China's transliteration system instead of Taiwan's own, offering unification of Taiwan with China if China apologizes for the Tiananmen incident, keeping silent on the democratic activity in Hong Kong and China's missile buildup against Taiwan, boycotting the arms purchase bill recklessly and asking foreigners to pronounce "Taipei" as "Taibei" in line with Beijing. Ma has become the favorite son of China. But is he the right choice for Taiwan in 2008?
Under Ma's seven-year administration, it's hard to cite major accomplishments in Taipei. Three inexcusable catastrophic incidents did occur: the cover-up of SARS cases, flooding of the rapid transit system and sending a critically injured child to a Taichung hospital.
Charles Hong
Columbus, Ohio
Two weeks ago, Malaysian actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) raised hackles in Taiwan by posting to her 2.6 million Instagram followers that she was visiting “Taipei, China.” Yeoh’s post continues a long-standing trend of Chinese propaganda that spreads disinformation about Taiwan’s political status and geography, aimed at deceiving the world into supporting its illegitimate claims to Taiwan, which is not and has never been part of China. Taiwan must respond to this blatant act of cognitive warfare. Failure to respond merely cedes ground to China to continue its efforts to conquer Taiwan in the global consciousness to justify an invasion. Taiwan’s government
This month’s news that Taiwan ranks as Asia’s happiest place according to this year’s World Happiness Report deserves both celebration and reflection. Moving up from 31st to 27th globally and surpassing Singapore as Asia’s happiness leader is gratifying, but the true significance lies deeper than these statistics. As a society at the crossroads of Eastern tradition and Western influence, Taiwan embodies a distinctive approach to happiness worth examining more closely. The report highlights Taiwan’s exceptional habit of sharing meals — 10.1 shared meals out of 14 weekly opportunities, ranking eighth globally. This practice is not merely about food, but represents something more
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
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