The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus used the tyranny of the majority to ensure the Anti-infiltration Act (反滲透法) passed on Tuesday, People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜), the party’s presidential candidate, said yesterday.
DPP legislators got the act passed without “coordination among government agencies, establishing enforcement rules or designating an administrative agency to oversee the act’s enforcement,” Soong said, adding that people’s rights would be violated because of the act.
Soong spoke against the act’s passage after attending an early morning flag-raising ceremony at Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall, saying that the act would cause Taiwanese who frequently do business or engage in cultural activities and tourism in China to fear for their lives.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
“There are 2 million Taiwanese businesspeople in China and they need to attend a lot of activities there. In the future, they and their family members will need to prove to themselves that they are not doing anything to threaten national security. They will be presumed guilty and it will be their responsibility to prove their innocence,” Soong said, adding that the DPP would function like the Taiwan Garrison Command, which suppressed dissidents during the Martial Law era.
People falsely accused of breaching the act would not be able to appeal, which is a complete violation of human rights, he added.
Soong also said at a news conference on Tuesday night that the DPP was so eager to have the act passed before the presidential and legislative elections on Saturday next week, because it apparently intends to use it to influence the results.
“The act pits supporters of different candidates against one another and reinforces people’s anxieties about losing the nation someday if China’s influence and infiltration efforts go unchecked. Passage of the act is of direct benefit to the DPP. We strongly protest this immoral move, which has caused the nation’s democracy to backslide,” he said.
The DPP must not forget that he and other party pioneers worked together 30 years ago to amend Article 100 of the Criminal Code so that no one could be imprisoned for their political beliefs, Soong said, adding that passage of the Anti-infiltration Act is “green terror,” with many viewing it as something the authoritarian regime of the past would have done.
People should not underestimate the act’s impact, as it affects them, as well as their families, friends and classmates, he said, adding that allegations against them could be fabricated.
National security is a collective responsibility, but procedural justice and solid evidence is needed before someone can be proven guilty, Soong said, adding that people should not think that they must compromise their political beliefs just because they do not back the DPP.
Soong urged people to show that they are unwilling to compromise by who they vote for on Saturday next week.
“The elections need to ensure that our democratic values and rights will not be permanently damaged,” Soong said. “If we want to be in charge of the nation again, we should first let the DPP, a party that acts like a bully and a dictator, lose the power to govern by putting into action the votes in our hands.”
National Kaohsiung University of Science and Technology (NKUST) yesterday promised it would increase oversight of use of Chinese in course materials, following a social media outcry over instances of simplified Chinese characters being used, including in a final exam. People on Threads wrote that simplified Chinese characters were used on a final exam and in a textbook for a translation course at the university, while the business card of a professor bore the words: “Taiwan Province, China.” Photographs of the exam, the textbook and the business card were posted with the comments. NKUST said that other members of the faculty did not see
The Taipei City Government yesterday said contractors organizing its New Year’s Eve celebrations would be held responsible after a jumbo screen played a Beijing-ran television channel near the event’s end. An image showing China Central Television (CCTV) Channel 3 being displayed was posted on the social media platform Threads, sparking an outcry on the Internet over Beijing’s alleged political infiltration of the municipal government. A Taipei Department of Information and Tourism spokesman said event workers had made a “grave mistake” and that the Television Broadcasts Satellite (TVBS) group had the contract to operate the screens. The city would apply contractual penalties on TVBS
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) and Chunghwa Telecom yesterday confirmed that an international undersea cable near Keelung Harbor had been cut by a Chinese ship, the Shunxin-39, a freighter registered in Cameroon. Chunghwa Telecom said the cable had its own backup equipment, and the incident would not affect telecommunications within Taiwan. The CGA said it dispatched a ship under its first fleet after receiving word of the incident and located the Shunxin-39 7 nautical miles (13km) north of Yehliu (野柳) at about 4:40pm on Friday. The CGA demanded that the Shunxin-39 return to seas closer to Keelung Harbor for investigation over the
A new board game set against the backdrop of armed conflict around Taiwan is to be released next month, amid renewed threats from Beijing, inviting players to participate in an imaginary Chinese invasion 20 years from now. China has ramped up military activity close to Taiwan in the past few years, including massing naval forces around the nation. The game, titled 2045, tasks players with navigating the troubles of war using colorful action cards and role-playing as characters involved in operations 10 days before a fictional Chinese invasion of Taiwan. That includes members of the armed forces, Chinese sleeper agents and pro-China politicians
RSS