After passing the support threshold in the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) presidential primary, Deputy Legislative Speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) listed three criteria for her running mate. The first criterion was that her running mate should be native Taiwanese.
This statement reflects the stance of the old KMT guard that believes native Taiwanese should not run for president, but should rather work as servants for “high-class” Mainlanders.
MAINLANDERS
This mindset was adopted by former president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), former vice president Lien Chan (連戰) and President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九). It is also a belief adopted by Hung, who is leaning even more heavily toward China. Some journalists who are Mainlanders have moved to condemn such attitudes, as it discriminates against native Taiwanese.
Based on their own conscience, such journalists are not afraid of being accused of “manipulating the ethnicity issue,” and it is an admirable approach. Taiwanese have long been aware of their unfair and unjust treatment, but they mostly tolerate it and are unwilling to address this sensitive issue. They allow discrimination to continue, causing some older Mainlanders to believe it is justified.
DISCRIMINATION
The KMT’s discrimination against other groups based on provincial origin is ugly. Discrimination against a racial or ethnic group usually occurs when a majority looks down on a minority. For example, black people, not white people, are often discriminated against in the US.
During the apartheid era in South Africa, a minority group of white colonists discriminated against black people, a majority. After the KMT government relocated to Taiwan, it claimed to represent China and implemented its colonial rule over the land by excluding native Taiwanese.
CORRUPTION
The native Taiwanese who put themselves forward for the KMT lacked the DNA of democratic reform and were void of talent. However, the party welcomed them for the good of its image. The people doing the discriminating and those being discriminated against formed a group of corruption.
To push for the localization of the KMT, then-president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) chose Lien, who adopted an ambiguous attitude toward provincial background, to be his running mate in Taiwan’s first direct presidential election in 1996. In the end, Lien turned out to be “deep blue.”
Before the presidential election in 2000, Lien said during a visit to Washington that there was no ethnic problem in Taiwan.
I could not take it anymore, so I said to Lien: “There might no longer be an ethnic problem in the nation economically and culturally, but when it comes to politicals, all the way from Chiang, Lee and yourself to People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) and former Control Yuan president Chen Li-an (陳履安), presidential candidates from the KMT have all chosen to team up with native Taiwanese. How do you explain this?”
Lien avoided my question at that time, saying only that he really hates to divide the people of Taiwan into Mainlanders from China and native Taiwanese because we are all from China originally. Clearly, he was willing to abuse the identity of others in order to avoid the existence of political discrimination.
James Wang is a senior journalist.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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
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
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
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of
RSS