A few days ago, Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) said that “gambling is a new vacation concept for the whole family.” When an anti-gambling organization issued a recorded video rebuttal, Hu obstinately stuck to his guns, saying that “gambling is still common in our society, but if we bring it into the area of normal and legally regulated activities, we generally refer to it as ‘gaming.’”
To publicly endorse casino gambling in the run-up to a July 7 referendum in Matsu on whether to allow casinos there seems to be an ill-intended attempt to turn Taiwan into an offshore money laundering center for China.
To support his point of view, Hu used Las Vegas as an example, saying that the US city cleaned up its casinos and turned the place into a family holiday resort during the 1990s. However, the MGM Grand Adventures Theme Park, which represented the biggest investment, was in trouble after only nine months.
In 2009, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) promoted a referendum on gambling in Penghu on the condition that gambling would not be legalized on Taiwan proper under Ma’s watch. Hu, however, thinks that “we should not look upon ‘gaming’ as some kind of ‘compensation’ and only allow the establishment of special zones in more slowly developing areas,” and is thus promoting the establishment of a special gambling district in Greater Taichung. The intent behind the text which would allow gambling in the Offshore Islands Development Act (離島建設條例) is finally revealed.
Due to its own incompetence, the KMT-run central government hopes a benevolent China will come to its rescue, and in the same way, because it is unwilling to improve transportation on Matsu, it now hopes big business will do so as part of their casino developments.
In terms of controlling law and order at casinos, Hu, who lacks all ability to maintain law and order in his city, is the least qualified of all mayors to promote casinos. The lethal shooting of alleged gang leader Weng Chi-nan (翁奇楠) in 2010 seemed to involve top city government officials and the case still has not been solved satisfactorily.
The publication of a survey into government efficiency revealed that Greater Taichung ranked lowest in terms of law and order, fire prevention and transportation, and fourth from the bottom in education. Netizens joke about a Greater Taichung hotel that opened a school by calling it “vertical integration.” One can only wonder if Hu’s single-minded push to allow gambling is also an attempt at “vertical integration” by creating a positive effect for the peripheral businesses surrounding the gambling industry.
The popular movement against gambling managed to win the battle in the Penghu gambling referendum three years ago and it embarrassed Ma, who has never dared to broach the subject since. However, the Matsu gambling referendum next month will see the gambling industry sink its teeth into local councils with councilors broaching the subject during interpellations and mayors responding by giving their support to gambling initiatives. Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊) had barely stepped down from her post as interim Democratic Progressive Party chairperson before she announced her support for developing a gambling tourism industry. Is this the policy direction of the nation’s biggest opposition party?
One can only wonder if Tainan Mayor William Lai (賴清德) will remain true to the anti-gambling stance he took as a lawmaker. At this crucial moment in time, voters will pay close attention to whether their politicians back the right side.
Pan Han-shen is the spokesman for the Green Party Taiwan.
Translated by Perry Svensson
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
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
I have heard people equate the government’s stance on resisting forced unification with China or the conditional reinstatement of the military court system with the rise of the Nazis before World War II. The comparison is absurd. There is no meaningful parallel between the government and Nazi Germany, nor does such a mindset exist within the general public in Taiwan. It is important to remember that the German public bore some responsibility for the horrors of the Holocaust. Post-World War II Germany’s transitional justice efforts were rooted in a national reckoning and introspection. Many Jews were sent to concentration camps not