Farmers yesterday ended their overnight protest in front of the Presidential Office against land seizures by the government, but despite their persistence, representatives were not granted a meeting with President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).
Thousands of farmers from all over the country and their supporters began their protest on Ketagalan Boulevard in front of the Presidential Office on Saturday evening and stayed there overnight.
About a dozen representatives of the farmers were invited to the Presidential Office yesterday morning, but they did not stay long because they said the president did not even receive them to show that he cared about their cause.
PHOTO: CHANG CHIA-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
“When [Ma] visited farming villages during his presidential campaign, he was given a warm welcome and he received farmers’ votes,” Taiwan Rural Front spokeswoman Tsai Pei-hui (蔡培慧) said. “Now that the farmers have come knocking on his door to voice their opposition to the government forcibly taking their land, the president refuses to see them.”
Tsai said in Western and other developed countries, governments rarely expropriate farmland, and even when they expropriate land, they do so in order to build public facilities, such as schools, roads and hospitals.
“The government should not just take whatever they want without any way for people to voice their opinion,” she said.
Yesterday, the demonstrators sowed seeds on Ketagalan Boulevard to show that they are determined to have their farmland returned to them.
“We are all farmers. We are praying to the gods to stop land expropriation,” said Liu Ching-chang (劉慶昌), a farmer in Erchongpu (二重埔) in Hsinchu County’s Jhudong Township (竹東).
Farmers from Dapu Borough (大埔) in Jhunan Township (竹南) and Wanbao Borough in Houlong Township (後龍), both in Miaoli County, Jhubei City (竹北), Erchongpu in Hsinchu County, Siangsihliao (相思寮) in Changhua County’s Erlin Township (二林) and Taipei County’s Tucheng (土城) gathered in front of the Presidential Office on Saturday night because all the communities have faced, or may be facing, government expropriation to make way for various development projects.
Although farmers across the country have been fighting land expropriation for years, their campaign did not gain public attention until the Miaoli County Government sent excavators escorted by police to dig up rice paddies in Dapu last month.
Later yesterday, Presidential Office Spokesman Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) said the president had instructed Premier Wu Dun-yih (吳敦義) to deal with the farmers’ grievances.
“Ma attached great importance to the rice paddy incident in Miaoli County’s Dapu” when he met with ranking officials on Saturday night, Lo said.
During that meeting, Ma instructed Wu to negotiate with the Miaoli County Government as soon as possible and to better manage the issue, Lo said.
“The most important thing is to take into consideration the feelings of the farmers and work out a [better] solution,” Lo quoted Ma as saying.
Additional reporting by Ko Shu-ling and Staff Writer
ENDEAVOR MANTA: The ship is programmed to automatically return to its designated home port and would self-destruct if seized by another party The Endeavor Manta, Taiwan’s first military-specification uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) tailor-made to operate in the Taiwan Strait in a bid to bolster the nation’s asymmetric combat capabilities made its first appearance at Kaohsiung’s Singda Harbor yesterday. Taking inspiration from Ukraine’s navy, which is using USVs to force Russia’s Black Sea fleet to take shelter within its own ports, CSBC Taiwan (台灣國際造船) established a research and development unit on USVs last year, CSBC chairman Huang Cheng-hung (黃正弘) said. With the exception of the satellite guidance system and the outboard motors — which were purchased from foreign companies that were not affiliated with Chinese-funded
PERMIT REVOKED: The influencer at a news conference said the National Immigration Agency was infringing on human rights and persecuting Chinese spouses Chinese influencer “Yaya in Taiwan” (亞亞在台灣) yesterday evening voluntarily left Taiwan, despite saying yesterday morning that she had “no intention” of leaving after her residence permit was revoked over her comments on Taiwan being “unified” with China by military force. The Ministry of the Interior yesterday had said that it could forcibly deport the influencer at midnight, but was considering taking a more flexible approach and beginning procedures this morning. The influencer, whose given name is Liu Zhenya (劉振亞), departed on a 8:45pm flight from Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) to Fuzhou, China. Liu held a news conference at the airport at 7pm,
Authorities yesterday elaborated on the rules governing Employment Gold Cards after a US cardholder was barred from entering Taiwan for six years after working without a permit during a 2023 visit. American YouTuber LeLe Farley was barred after already being approved for an Employment Gold Card, he said in a video published on his channel on Saturday. Farley, who has more than 420,000 subscribers on his YouTube channel, was approved for his Gold Card last month, but was told at a check-in counter at the Los Angeles International Airport that he could not enter Taiwan. That was because he previously participated in two
SECURITY RISK: If there is a conflict between China and Taiwan, ‘there would likely be significant consequences to global economic and security interests,’ it said China remains the top military and cyber threat to the US and continues to make progress on capabilities to seize Taiwan, a report by US intelligence agencies said on Tuesday. The report provides an overview of the “collective insights” of top US intelligence agencies about the security threats to the US posed by foreign nations and criminal organizations. In its Annual Threat Assessment, the agencies divided threats facing the US into two broad categories, “nonstate transnational criminals and terrorists” and “major state actors,” with China, Russia, Iran and North Korea named. Of those countries, “China presents the most comprehensive and robust military threat
RSS