President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Dec. 19 convened a meeting at her official residence with leading members of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) on the merger and elevation to special municipality status of Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County.
At a news conference following the meeting, it was revealed that the participants had achieved a “high degree of consensus” on the proposed merger, although there were differing opinions within the party on DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming’s (柯建銘) suggestion of amending the Local Government Act (地方制度法) to lower the threshold for the upgrade to go ahead.
Tsai had previously, in her capacity as DPP chairperson during a meeting of the party’s Central Standing Committee, said that the merger of Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County was a matter of urgency and that amendments to the act should be completed as soon as possible.
With the DPP supporting the Hsinchu merger, it could become the nation’s seventh special municipality before the nine-in-one mayoral and county commissioner elections next year.
Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County were once part of a single administrative division, under Shinchiku Prefecture — which also included Taoyuan and Miaoli County — during the Japanese colonial era, giving support to the argument that the proposed merger has historical and geographical logic.
As Tsai has said, the merger is based upon long-term international trade considerations and the reconfiguration of global supply chains, with Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County being a major technology center.
The merger would bolster the influence of the local government and strengthen the ability of some of the nation’s core industries to develop.
Many industry leaders have also expressed their support for the merger because the Hsinchu Science Park (新竹科學園區) is currently split between two jurisdictions, the city and the county, and different areas are subject to separate regulations, increasing costs.
Merging the two jurisdictions would lead to better integration of administrative resources, they say.
In addition, the mayors of special municipalities sit in on central government meetings, so they have more influence on issues that affect their jurisdiction and the decisionmaking process that affects national policy.
Opinion polls show that more than 50 percent of residents of Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County are supportive of the merger and the region’s promotion to a special municipality, showing a high degree of consensus on the issue among the local populace.
There are clear benefits to local residents, as well as industries, and it should be reasonably easy to complete the procedure in a relatively short amount of time.
However, even though there are few procedural impediments, and despite Hsinchu County Commissioner Yang Wen-ke (楊文科) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) originally responding positively to the idea when it was suggested by Hsinchu Mayor Lin Chih-chien (林智堅) of the DPP in September, a few days later the KMT criticized the DPP for making unilateral decisions on regional development, and since then Yang has changed his tune.
He is now suggesting that any merger of the two areas should include Miaoli County, saying that to leave Miaoli County out of the merger would be unfair on its prospects for future development.
The political makeup of Miaoli County is far more sympathetic to the pan-blue camp than the pan-green camp, and so the suggested inclusion of Miaoli County is clearly a political calculation.
The pan-blue camp believes that a merger between Hsinchu City, Hsinchu County and Miaoli County would be electorally advantageous, and if Miaoli County is left out in the cold, the pan-blue camp can tell its local supporters in Miaoli that it was the DPP that opposed the proposal.
In other words, the pan-blue camp would stand to win from the situation, whether Miaoli County is included in the merger or not.
Different parties each have their own political calculations, but it turns out that the proposed Hsinchu merger has exposed a whole raft of other problems.
There are opposing views not just between the governing and opposition parties, but also different voices emerging within the parties themselves.
The DPP has proposed an amendment to the act to do away with the condition that “only a region with a population of 1.25 million or more that has special needs for political, economic, cultural and metropolitan development” can be reconstituted as a special municipality, to address the issue that the combined population of Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County does not meet the threshold for a merger.
Other regions, such as KMT-controlled Changhua County, do have the population required by the legal threshold and are also vying to be considered for promotion to a special municipality.
DPP-controlled Keelung, which has the largest container port in northern Taiwan, also has a case for saying that it qualifies as having “special needs for political, economic, cultural and metropolitan development.”
It is right that the government select Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County to be the seventh special municipality, given their strategic requirements as an area housing developing technologies.
The government must not shy away from preparing for the rezoning and reallocation of resources that would likely come under scrutiny when the proposal is made, and to make sure that it has all of the planning in place.
The Tsai administration has talked before about integrated regional governance and has placed an emphasis on “equal rights for cities and counties,” but has yet to prepare adequately for the necessary legal amendments and supplementary measures, together with the reallocation of funds and powers that the rezoning would entail under the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法).
Cities and counties with the potential to be upgraded to a special municipality are vying with one another to be given priority consideration, and are pulling further away from other cities and counties, and this is giving the opposition parties more opportunity to manipulate the situation for their own political gain.
If the DPP is going to support the elevation and merger of Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County, it is going to have to make sure that it has a comprehensive plan in place.
In her Double Ten National Day address this year, Tsai said: “We must respond to national development needs by making necessary adjustments to bureaucracy, local institutions, national land use, regional development and other important governance issues, so that we can optimize government efficiency and most faithfully reflect the will of the people.”
For Tsai, it is important not simply to consider the needs of individual cities and counties, but to “respond to national development needs.”
This must supersede political rivalry between the government and opposition parties, and must provide an overall blueprint for the nation’s development.
At the same time, the opposition must stop opposing the merger for opposition’s sake, and should take a more proactive role in reaching a consensus with the government on the best way to lead the nation forward.
This touches upon the most basic question here: How many special municipalities, cities and counties does Taiwan actually need? Is this about maintaining a hierarchy between the central government, special municipalities, cities and counties, or seeking an improved allocation of administrative resources?
The results of the four referendums earlier this month, in which the majority of voters supported the positions advocated by the Tsai administration, were an endorsement of the trajectory of national development during the president’s second term in office and a mandate for Tsai to step up the pace of the policies her administration is pursuing.
The day after the referendums, during the high-level meeting at her official residence, Tsai and DPP officials deliberated upon which of the government’s policies were to be prioritized now that the referendums are over.
These included reinforcing international trade channels and lifting the ban on food imports from regions of Japan affected by the meltdown at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant.
The “high degree of consensus” mentioned in the news conference following the meeting was apparently concentrated on the question of whether to go ahead with the Hsinchu merger.
Given the seniority of those present at the meeting, including the president herself, the presumption must be that questions such as how to expedite the redrawing of national territory were given due consideration.
A number of DPP legislators have yet to sign up to the proposal to amend the Local Government Act that the party has suggested to facilitate the merger.
This is not because they oppose the proposal, it is because the question of whether to promote Hsinchu to a special municipality has repercussions for other counties and cities, in terms of local governance and political rivalry.
If the government wants to make the proposed merger go smoothly, and reduce as much as possible the amount of white noise, it must prepare for the reallocation of resources and the rezoning, and to make sure all of its plans are put into operation.
Translated by Paul Cooper
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