Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

 
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Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

The Control Yuan and scapegoating

For obvious reasons, all eyes have been on the Control Yuan’s review of the government’s response to Typhoon Morakot. Soon after the typhoon hit Taiwan and the devastation in the south became apparent, Control Yuan President Wang Chien-shien (王建煊) reacted to the government’s incompetent response with the classic line: “I was so angry that I wanted to scold and kill people, but I didn’t know who to blame.”

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) did, however. His first public criticism was directed at the Central Weather Bureau (CWB). Someone or something had to be immediately accountable, and the easiest target was a bunch of civil-service meteorologists with no opportunity to defend their organization or their individual professionalism.

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Balancing US, PRC comfort zones

When Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was elected president, the immediate US reaction was to heave a sigh of relief because Ma’s pro-­China policies were expected to relax the tense cross-strait relationship. In practice, things have turned out slightly differently, as “pro-China” became “submit to China,” and this raised flags in the US, as can be seen from a series of recent events.

When the new director of the American Institute in Taiwan, William Stanton, visited Minister of Justice Wang Ching-feng (王清峰) on Sept. 30, he said that “people overseas had some different thoughts” on the trial of former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). Why would he risk being accused of interfering with Taiwan’s internal affairs by bringing up this case? Clearly because the US now feels it is no longer a clear-cut judicial matter.

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Taiwan's core interests under PRC attack

Taiwan's 23 million people were send an explicit notice Wednesday of the "clear and present" threat posed to our hard-won democratic freedoms by the Chinese Communist Party-ruled People's Republic of China and facilitated by the China-centric right-wing Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) government under President Ma Ying-jeou.

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Putting the brakes on education

In a speech on Wednesday to the nation’s civil servants, Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) said that maintaining sovereignty and ensuring the interests of Taiwanese remained the guiding principles of the government’s cross-strait policy.

“We should not do things that are not beneficial to the public. Those who execute cross-strait policies should act as gatekeepers when necessary and step on the brakes where necessary to maintain these principles,” the premier said.

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Newsflash


Minister of Economic Affairs Chang Chia-juch, second left, and Minister of Foreign Affairs David Lin, right, hold a news conference in Taipei after Taiwan and Singapore signed a free-trade agreement in Singapore earlier yesterday.
Photo: Pichi Chuang, Reuters

Taiwan yesterday signed a far-reaching free-trade agreement (FTA) with Singapore — the first of its kind with a Southeast Asian country — in a move the government said would boost the nation’s efforts to pursue further economic engagement with trading partners bilaterally and multilaterally.

“This is a milestone achievement for Taiwan’s progress toward economic liberalization and our participation in regional economic integration,” Minister of Economic Affairs Chang Chia-juch (張家祝) told a press conference at 11am in Taipei.