Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

As Taiwan’s Jan. 14 presidential election approaches, one idea is becoming clearer and clearer: Taiwan cannot afford to waste another four years under Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) as president. Despite measured hopes and claims, predictions on Taiwan’s GDP growth continue to fall; they have now dipped into the 3 percent bracket. This indicates that the so-called “Golden Decade” that Ma has adopted as his campaign slogan has already died, in the same way that his “6-3-3” promise, of 6 percent annual growth, annual per capita income of US$30,000 and an unemployment rate below 3 percent, never got off the blocks.

The Ministry of Justice’ Investigation Bureau (MJIB) has ordered that all documents related to monitoring President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) opponents in the presidential election must be destroyed after the illegal practice was disclosed by the media, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, citing an anonymous source inside the bureau.

Documents provided by the source seem to confirm the existence of a project, codenamed “An-Ping-Shun Project,” to monitor DPP presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and People First Party (PFP) candidate James Soong (宋楚瑜), DPP lawyer Hsu Kuo-yong (徐國勇) said at a DPP legislative caucus press conference.