Police accused of political meddling
　

BACK AND FORTH: The DPP was outraged by police blocking streets to protect the president, while NSB special agents wore candidate campaign vests while on duty
　

By Jenny W. Hsu, Loa Iok-sin and Mo Yan-chih
STAFF REPORTERS
Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 1

“I have walked on these streets for 30 years during election seasons. I merely wanted to cross the road to shake hands with residents, but the police refused to let us through ... All roads had to be cleared to make way for Ma.”— Fank Hsieh, former premier

The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday accused the police of sabotaging the pan-green camp’s campaign activities to give the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) an edge in next Saturday’s local elections and likened the situation to the White Terror.

In the last two days, police cracked down on pan-green camp campaign activities in Hsinchu and Keelung, saying the DPP had failed to apply for permission to canvass on the streets, the DPP said.

“The practice of canvassing on the street has been used in Taiwan for years. Since when does a candidate need to apply for road rights to stump for votes?” DPP Legislator Chen Ting-fei (陳亭妃) said.

DPP Kaohsiung City Councilor Chao Tien-lin (趙天麟) said police tried to prevent Hung Seng-yong (洪森永), a DPP candidate for the Keelung City Council, and his motorcade from making the rounds yesterday afternoon, saying Hung had not applied for permission.

Shortly prior to Hung’s scheduled road show, his campaign headquarters received a phone call from Keelung police warning Hung that the activity would violate the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法), Chao said.

This was the first time that Hung had been informed of the seven-day application period required for street campaigns in the city, Chao said, adding that neither Hung nor rival KMT candidates had been stopped by the police during street campaigning in recent weeks.

“We decided to ignore the warning and took to the streets. The police followed us the entire way and collected evidence by filming every person participating in Hung’s campaign. If this isn’t White Terror tactics, I don’t know what is,” Chao said.

The DPP and its supporters staged a sit-in protest in front of the Keelung Second Police Precinct to demand an explanation from the police chief.

The protest ended at around 8pm after Keelung Second Police Precinct chief Chen I-feng (陳逸峰) met the protesters and said that the police had not been “collecting evidence.”

He said the police were doing their duty to ensure the safety of the candidates, as yesterday marked the first day of the official campaign period in the run-up to next Saturday’s election.

Heated clashes also erupted between KMT and DPP supporters on Tuesday night in Hsinchu when the police blocked off streets while President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) accompanied the KMT’s Hsinchu County commissioner candidate, Chiu Ching-chun (邱鏡淳), on a visit to a night market in Jhubei City (竹北), obstructing a DPP campaign group led by former premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷).

Scuffles broke out between supporters from the two camps after the DPP supporters protested against the police blocking the streets for Ma, who doubles as KMT chairman.

Hsieh was promoting the DPP’s Hsinchu County commissioner candidate, Peng Shao-chin (彭紹瑾), at a campaign event in the area.

On his blog, Hsieh said he was pushed and shoved by police as he tried to cross a street to shake hands with voters.

The police insisted no one was allowed through because the president was coming, Hsieh wrote.

“I have walked on these streets for 30 years during election seasons. I merely wanted to cross the road to shake hands with residents, but the police refused to let us through ... All roads had to be cleared to make way for Ma,” Hsieh wrote. “It is regrettable that 22 years after the end of martial law, Taiwan’s freedom is being destroyed by Ma’s KMT.”

Hsieh said it was unnecessary for the police to clear the streets for Ma because he was appearing in his capacity as KMT chairman, not as the president.

DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) accused the police of overstepping their bounds and said their behavior could lead to more violent clashes when China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) visits Taichung next month.

The KMT, meanwhile, pointed the finger at Hsieh, urging him not to provoke conflict.

“Hsieh’s provocative approach reminded voters of his old tactics in the presidential election ... We urge Hsieh not to turn the local elections into an extension of the presidential election,” KMT spokesman Lee Chien-jung (李建榮) said yesterday at KMT headquarters.

Hsieh should rather use his energy to compete with former premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) if he intends to run in the 2012 presidential election, Lee said.

Meanwhile, a reporter with online news outlet Taiwan Independent Media, Clyde Kan (簡世寬), said he was considering filing a lawsuit against two police officers who he said tried to take him to the police station for no apparent reason.

He also said they twisted his arms before Ma was scheduled to visit Jhubei City with Chiu.

Kan told the Taipei Times in a telephone interview that he was playing a hand-held videogame as he awaited the arrival of Hsieh and Peng.

“A police car stopped, two plainclothes officers came out and asked to check my national ID card. I declined and told them they had no right to check my ID because I was just standing there doing nothing,” Kan said. “They responded by grabbing my hands and wanted to put me in the squad car and take me to the police station.”

Kan said he told the officers that he is a journalist and wanted to show them his press pass, but they told him not to move.

One of Kan’s colleagues recorded the argument between Kan and the police on video and posted it on the company’s Web site. The video shows the officers repeatedly trying to cover the camera with their hands while saying they had the right to detain Kan for up to three hours to check his identity and interrogate him.

The officers finally released Kan when former DPP legislator Kao Chien-chih (高建智) showed up and asked what was going on.

“It was too much — the police don’t know to respect a citizen’s basic rights,” Kan said.

“They twisted my arms when they tried to force me into the car. I will speak with my attorney to see if I should file a lawsuit against them,” Kan said.

In related news, at the request of the Presidential Office, the National Security Bureau (NSB) yesterday apologized over a controversy in which NSB special agents wore candidate campaign vests while on duty.

The special agents were spotted wearing Chiu campaign vests and baseball caps while working in Ma’s security detail during the campaign events on Tuesday night.

The DPP accused the NSB of abusing its authority.

NSB official Yang Hsiao-hua (楊小華) said he had asked the agents to wear the campaign outfits as a disguise to help them blend into the crowd while providing security.

“We just wanted to do our jobs well, but I admit that we did not realize that it would result in a misunderstanding,” NSB Chief Chi Tai-lai (冀泰來) said.

In response to the DPP’s criticism of the security measures that were used to protect Ma, Lee said that Hsieh had also enjoyed tight security when he served as premier in the former DPP government.

“Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) also enjoyed round-the-clock security even during the election campaign. The DPP should not forget about the high-level security measures its politicians enjoyed when they were in power,” Lee said.

“It is irresponsible to be provocative and then blame the police for doing their duty,” Lee said.

Voters’ trust for Tsai surpasses Ma, poll shows
　

OPINION: Confidence in the DPP chairwoman rose, while trust in Ma dropped. Trust in the DPP meanwhile rose to narrow the gap with the level of trust in the KMT
　

By Ko Shu-ling
STAFF REPORTER
Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 1

Voters’ confidence in Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) surpassed that of her Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) counterpart, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), for the first time since the two took charge of their respective parties, a poll released yesterday by the Chinese-language Global Views magazine (遠見) showed.

Public trust in the DPP also surged to a new three-year high, the survey showed.

The poll, conducted by the Global Views Survey Research Center, put Tsai’s trust index at 46.2 on a scale of 0 to 100, up 0.1 points from last month, while Ma’s dropped 2.6 points from last month to 43.9 this month.

Tsai’s trust index has risen to its highest level since she took over as DPP chairwoman in May last year. Ma became the KMT chairman last month.

DPP GAINS ON KMT

The level of trust in the DPP stood at 39.4 points, just below its record high of 39.5 set in August. The center began conducting the polls in June 2006.

The KMT’s trust index was 41.5 this month, a drop of 0.6 points from last month and just 2.1 higher than that of the DPP.

Center director Lian Tai (戴立安) said the improvement in Tsai and her party’s trust indexes had a lot to do with the diminishing impact of former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) corruption trial and increasing public expectations for the country’s largest opposition party.

Tai said it remained to be seen whether the drop in the KMT and Ma’s trust indexes would be reflected in next Saturday’s local elections.

While Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) had enjoyed more public trust than Ma over the past two months, Wu’s trust index ­plummeted 7.7 points from last month to 43.7 this month.

Tai said that while this was not the sharpest drop in the confidence ratings this month, it was the main reason for the drop in the KMT’s overall trust index.

Tai attributed Wu’s decline in confidence to the negative impact of reports of the premier’s association with a former convict, adding that it had also dealt a blow to the public’s trust in Ma.

MOOD INDEX

The public mood index this month remained below 50 at a low of 40.7 points, a 1.8 point drop from last month.

The public mood index consists of two indicators: the political confidence index (PCI) and the economic confidence index (ECI). The PCI fell 2.9 points from last month to 45.5 this month, while the ECI was 0.6 points lower this month at 35.9.

The political optimism index for next month dropped 1.8 points to 49.3, while the level of trust that the cross-strait detente will be maintained next month fell 0.8 points to 60.4, the lowest point since December last year.

Tai said the plunge might have something to do with public doubts about an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) the Ma administration seeks to sign with Beijing.

The index for political stability next month also dived to 38.2 points from 41 last month, which Tai attributed to the DPP’s displeasure with the government’s decision to relax restrictions on US beef, the way the administration handled a financial memorandum of understanding with China as well as the tension caused by the local elections.

On the economic front, the current economic situation index was 26.8 points, a decrease of 0.6 points from last month.

The economic optimism index fell 0.6 points to 45 points. Next month’s index for the improvement of the domestic economy fell by 0.3 points to 46.4, and that for the improvement for personal finances was down 0.9 points to 43.5.

The poll was conducted from Nov. 15 to Nov. 17 and 1,004 adults countrywide were surveyed.

Groups take stand against legalization of sex industry
　

By Loa Iok-sin
STAFF REPORTER
Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 2
　

On International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women yesterday, domestic and foreign women’s groups protested the government’s plan to legalize the sex industry.

“Studies show that more than 50 percent of sex workers in the Netherlands — the country considered to have the most open sex industry — are often threatened, beaten or even raped by pimps and clients,” Chi Hui-jung (紀惠容), executive director of the Garden of Hope Foundation and member of the Alliance against Sexual Exploitation, told a news conference yesterday.

“The Rotterdam City Government has already decided to scrap the city’s special sex industry district, while the Amsterdam City Government has said its red light district has become a hotbed for human trafficking, sexual exploitation and money laundering,” she said.

The Amsterdam City Council has announced that a 10-year urban renovation project will be launched in 2012, with a 50 percent reduction of sex shop windows as part of the project, Chi said.

Several women’s groups from abroad also voiced their support for their Taiwanese counterparts via recorded videos shown at the press conference.

“The sex industry is closely associated with human trafficking and women’s organizations around the world are working together to stop sexual exploitation of women and girls,” said Taina Bien-Aime, executive director of Equality Now, an international organization for rights of women. “I hope the government of Taiwan would seek to understand more about how other countries — such as Sweden, Norway, Iceland, the Philippines and Nepal — are working to protect women and children in the sex trade and punish the exploiters.”

Victor Malarek, a Canadian journalist and author of several books on the sex industry, said that abolishing the sex industry was the only way to end violence against women.

“Some people believe that legalizing the sex industry could give women a safer environment, but that’s not true — it only reduces the damage,” Malarek said.

“For example, you may have eight or nine cases of sexual assault per month now, and you may reduce the number to two or three [after legalizing the industry],” he said.

A representative from the Sexual Assault Support Centre of Ottawa said that legalizing the sex industry would only make gender equality harder to achieve, because the policy could encourage people to think that “the female body is merchandise available anywhere” and “block the realization of gender equality.”

Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation executive director Kang Shu-hua (康淑華) urged the government “to realize global trends in handling the sex industry,” adding that reducing the size of the sex industry “is the only way to end exploitation of women and better protect their rights.”

The alliance said it would visit candidates in the local government chief elections to seek their support against legalizing the sex industry.
　

Morakot victims demand to be rehoused
　

By Flora Wang
STAFF REPORTER
Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 3
　

Several hundred Aborigines from communities seriously affected by Typhoon Morakot staged a protest outside the Executive Yuan yesterday demanding that the government immediately relocate them from temporary accommodation in military camps.

Demonstrators from the Siraya, Piwan, Rukai, Bunun and Tsou people urged the Executive Yuan’s Morakot Post-Disaster Reconstruction Council to help the communities resume their tribal and family lives by accommodating them in prefabricated houses.

The protesters called on the council to stop designating certain areas hit by the typhoon and mudslides as uninhabitable and to investigate the causes of the disaster. They also complained about the failure of the government to involve victims of the typhoon in reconstruction efforts.

The Legislative Yuan passed the Post-Typhoon Morakot Reconstruction Special Act (莫拉克颱風災後重建特別條例) on Aug. 27, empowering the central government to “forcibly relocate” residents living in “dangerous places” or “overexploited areas” after consulting with residents.

Reconstruction has proceeded since late August, but the victims said they had seen limited progress.

The demonstrators yesterday blocked the Executive Yuan’s front gate and demanded that Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義), who was presiding over a meeting of the council inside, meet them.

The protesters were involved in minor clashes with police officers when they forced their way to the front gate of the Executive Yuan. Some protesters climbed onto a fence while police tried to push them down.

Wu sent Lwo Shih-hsiung (羅世雄), chief executive officer of the Executive Yuan’s office in southern Taiwan, to meet the protesters, but Lwo returned to the Executive Yuan after the latter refused to speak to him as he was not the decision-maker in the reconstruction council.

“We have been taking what you want seriously,” Lwo told protesters before leaving.

Deputy Executive Officer of the council Chen Chen-chuan (陳振川) later showed up to assure the Aborigines that more than 300 prefabricated homes were under construction in six cities and counties affected by the storm while 200 houses have been completed.

He said the government would respect and consult with the communities in reconstruction efforts.

The protesters threatened to stage a demonstration on Ketagalan Boulevard in front of the Presidential Office next month should the government fail to resolve the relocation issue.

Police impartiality in question

Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 8

The image of the nation’s law enforcement authorities was severely tarnished by the visit to Taiwan in November last year of China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林).

During the visit, the public witnessed police infringe on the rights and freedom of expression of Taiwanese by confiscating flags and other items without legitimate reason, stopping and questioning people who wore T-shirts that read “Taiwan is my country” and ordering a music store located near a hotel where Chen was dining to shut down because it was playing the Song of Taiwan, claiming the music was too loud.

Granted, police were acting under orders, but their abusive and arrogant behavior was a sad departure from the public image of officers as helpful public servants.

Unfortunately, such a negative image was reinforced on Tuesday night when clashes erupted between police, security agents and supporters of the Democratic Progressive Party in Hsinchu County. News footage showed some police and security agents pushing and shoving to force pan-green supporters to give way ahead of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) arrival.

As it is the police’s duty to maintain order, they deserve respect for doing their job. The same applies to the president’s security detail, whose primary task is to keep him out of harm’s way. The question is whether it was necessary for police to act in such an aggressive and abusive manner against people who were simply exercising their right to campaign and did not mean any harm to the president.

Some may also recall how Tainan City Police Bureau Commissioner Chen Fu-hsiang (陳富祥) was transferred and slapped with a demerit in October last year for allegedly failing to protect ARATS Vice Chairman Zhang Mingqing (張銘清), who fell and lost his glasses in a scuffle with independence activists during a visit to Tainan’s Confucius Temple. National Police Agency (NPA) Director-General Wang Cho-chiun (王卓鈞) also asked to be disciplined to take responsibility for the matter.

Contrast this with the police’s response to two recent crimes: A man was robbed of NT$77 million (US$2.38 million) by gunmen in Tainan City in the biggest cash heist in the country in recent history; another man was shot at least 10 times in broad daylight in Tainan County’s Yongkang City (永康市) on Tuesday.

However, as of yesterday, higher police authorities had yet to dedicate themselves to solving the crimes to a level comparable to that for the Zhang incident. This creates the impression that police are more interested in carrying out partisan politics than fighting crime and bringing criminals to justice.

Ma has often stressed the importance of public opinion, lecturing his government and government officials to be mindful of the public’s feelings. The NPA and the National Security Bureau would do well to heed Ma’s advice.

With the local government elections less than two weeks away, political campaigns, activities, public exchanges are expected to intensify. The least we can expect is that the nation’s law enforcement officers remain impartial and do their job rather than currying favor with higher authorities.

Obama’s test in China
　

Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 8

US President Barack Obama has been roundly criticized after his recent Asian trip. Many are ready to pin the unflattering insignia of Jimmy Carter on him, referring to the former US president’s penchant for bungling international matters — the Iran-hostage crisis in particular.

But it is the drawing of parallels between the political backdrop today and what existed when US president John F. Kennedy was in office that seems to portend most ominously. Kennedy’s steep learning curve was spurred by then-Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev’s placement of nuclear missiles in Cuba. It is believed that the crisis, while testing the young US president’s mettle, was consequent to his relatively unseasoned encounter with the Soviet leader some three months earlier in 1961. Similar to the Soviet Union then, China is a rising superpower seemingly primed to challenge the US’ premier role in the world stage.

While in Beijing, Obama quickly acquiesced to respecting “China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity” and left out in the joint communique any reference to the Taiwan Relations Act, the bedrock of US-Taiwan relations for three decades and widely credited with maintaining the relative tranquility in the Taiwan Strait. Given that the significance of the TRA lies in the perception of its deterrent capability, its value has been eroded by its omission in the communique.

If the pretext of “deference to his Chinese host” for these concessions is to be believed, Obama’s performance in the presence of Chinese President Hu Jin-tao (胡錦濤) might be even more one-sided than that of Kennedy when he faced Khrushchev. This comes at a time when Taiwan’s defense readiness is slipping badly, thanks in no small part to President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) glaring signals of his “readiness” to succumb.

Combining this with Beijing’s long-held desire to annex Taiwan and its knowledge of the necessity of a forceful conquest prior to achieving that objective, the danger to peace in the Taiwan Strait has probably risen to its highest since the early days of Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) escape to Taiwan. The Taiwan Strait seems ripe to turn into Obama’s Cuba unless the other leg of Washington’s foreign affair checks and balances springs into action.

In 1979, the US Congress reacted to Carter’s severance of formal US-Taiwan ties by enacting the TRA, a momentous undertaking in retrospect. Given today’s international atmosphere and the US’ current economic woes, an encore might be beyond the realm of reality. But it is certain that Taiwanese, and perhaps the rest of the free world, want to avoid all occasions where the question of whether Obama can measure up to Kennedy has to be answered.

HUANG JEI-HSUAN
Los Angeles, California

Ma and Hu both under pressure on unification
　

By Paul Lin 林保華
Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 8

‘Several opinion polls ... suggest that about 70 percent of the public consider themselves Taiwanese.’

A seminar IN Taipei to mark the 60th anniversary of cross-strait relations on Nov. 13 and Nov. 14 was intended to reflect the changes in the relationship between Taiwan and China over the years, but regrettably, the Chinese mindset remains the same as it was six decades ago: China will annex Taiwan. Not even the pan-blue camp, which supports mutual cooperation between the two nations, can accept this notion.

The Chinese delegation was led by Zheng Bijian (鄭必堅), who was introduced in the media as a member of Chinese President Hu Jintao’s (胡錦濤) brain trust and a former vice president of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) Central Party School. Zheng is widely credited for being the first to talk publicly about China’s “peaceful” rise during the Boao Forum in 2003 to allay growing global concerns about Beijing’s expanding power. However, this notion of peaceful development is nothing but an illusion, with Beijing throwing a big military parade to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China last month. Two conclusions that can be drawn from Zheng’s rigid mindset and the incoherent comments of other Chinese delegates at the seminar were that they are blind to reality and that Hu Jintao wishes to rush unification with Taiwan.

Zheng’s remark that the majority of the public opposed Taiwanese independence and that the independence movement was doomed was sheer nonsense. It is clear that he misconstrued Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) election as president as public opposition to Taiwanese independence. Ma did not have the nerve to hold a referendum on signing an economic cooperation framework agreement with China because of strong public opposition to the economic pact. Several opinion polls conducted by the Mainland Affairs Council also suggest that about 70 percent of the public consider themselves Taiwanese. Although “Taiwanese” does not necessarily mean “people in support of Taiwanese independence,” it is certainly different from “Chinese.”

Why did these Chinese delegates participate in the seminar? That’s because Hu is in a rush. Ma is not aggressive enough and the Chinese delegates were afraid that the Democratic Progressive Party might return to power. Hu is also at a disadvantage in an internal party struggle, and it was obvious that he was under considerable stress during the APEC summit. Hu must therefore resort to united-front tactics to carry out Beijing’s unification agenda.

Ma is in the same situation. His approval ratings have dropped and he has lost much weight as he comes under increasing attack within his party. Thus, he is in a desperate need of Hu’s support. The hasty signing of a memorandum of understanding on cross-strait financial supervisory cooperation reflects the similarities in their situation.

The problem is not the decline of support for Taiwanese independence, but the fact that Beijing’s authoritarian government is on the wane and local factions are on the rise as evidenced by Beijing’s failure to control the political situation in Xinjiang and Chongqing.

Paul Lin is a political commentator.

China Strategic reaffirms commitmen
　

GOING NOWHERE: China Strategic said it would use the proceeds it raises by selling a 30 percent stake in Nan Shan Life to buy shares of Chinatrust Financial
　

By Joyce Huang
STAFF REPORTER
Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 12
　

China Strategic Holdings Ltd (中策集團) will remain committed to the local market even if it eventually releases its controlling stake in Nan Shan Life Insurance Co (南山人壽) to Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金控), an executive said yesterday.

“None of our money invested in Taiwan will leave the local market,” Raymond Or (柯清輝), vice chairman and chief executive officer of Hong Kong-based China Strategic, told a media briefing in Taipei.

“If Chinatrust Financial buys more of our shares in Nan Shan [as agreed in a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed last week], we will use the proceeds to increase our stake in Chinatrust Financial,” he said.

China Strategic formed a consortium with its 80 percent-owned Primus Financial Holdings Ltd to acquire a 97.57 percent stake in Taipei-based Nan Shan from financially troubled American International Group Inc (AIG) for US$2.15 billion on Oct. 13.

The acquisition deal, which is still pending regulatory approval in both Taiwan and the US, is expected to expire in nine months. China Strategic will negotiate an extension with AIG if it fails to receive regulatory approval before next July, Or said.

On Nov. 17, China Strategic, formerly a battery maker, announced unexpectedly that it would relinquish 30 percent of its Nan Shan shares to Chinatrust Financial for US$660 million.

China Strategic said it would use the proceeds to buy 1.172 billion new common shares of Chinatrust Financial, which the Taipei-based financial services provider would issue at NT$17.74 per share via a private placement.

China Strategic would then hold a 9.95 percent stake in Chinatrust Financial, the companies said at the time.

Or, 60, formerly vice chairman of Hang Sheng Bank Ltd (恆生銀行) in Hong Kong, said yesterday that even after the share transfer — expected within three years — China Strategic would remain the biggest shareholder in Nan Shan, with a 54 percent stake, followed by Chinatrust Financial at 30 percent and Primus Financial at 13.5 percent.

The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) last week criticized China Strategic for “lacking consistency” in handling the acquisition. Further doubt was cast on the deal when the FSC rejected a private placement application by Chinatrust Financial, also last week.

Chinatrust Financial said on Tuesday that the application, submitted in early September, was rejected on Friday on the grounds that “details to the fundraising scheme” were “missing.”

A company executive yesterday declined to speculate on whether the rejection had to do with the anticipated participation of China Strategic in its planned private placement.

FSC Banking Bureau head Chang Ming-daw (張明道) told the Chinese-language United Evening News that the application was rejected because Chinatrust Financial failed to clarify how it would use the NT$44.35 billion (US$1.37 billion) in capital raised through the private placement.

He declined to say whether the FSC would approve the application if part of the money is used to inject funds into Nan Shan together with China Strategic.

Despite the increasing obstacles to regulatory approval, Or expressed confidence that the transaction could be closed by introducing a local partner.

“We believe our partnership with Chinatrust Financial will be a win-win-win deal that puts Nan Shan’s interests first,” he said.

He said the company believed the public, the legislature and Nan Shan employees would find it easier to accept China Strategic as the new owner with a local partner.

“The biggest challenge for us now is to win acceptance” in Taiwan, Or said.

He said none of the company’s capital — which comes from 45 investors including three corporate investors — is China-funded.

He also said the company’s plan to borrow US$700 million from First Commercial Bank (第一銀行) and Taiwan Cooperative Bank (合作金庫銀行) to fund the acquisition had not run into any obstacles.

Prisoners drum up self-confidence
　

Thanks to an arts program at Changhua Prison, a group of inmates is discovering the benefits of drumming and meditation with the help of percussion troupe U-Theatre. The two perform together tomorrow at Changhua County Stadium

By David Chen
STAFF REPORTER
Thursday, Nov 26, 2009, Page 13
　

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A group of 15 male inmates at Changhua Prison (彰化監獄) is learning that there is more to percussion than just beating a drum.

For the past three months, the men, chosen through a prison-wide audition, have been studying with the Taipei-based performing arts group U-Theatre (優人神鼓), which is renowned for its unique combination of drumming, Zen meditation and martial arts.

“In studying with U-Theatre, we’ve learned to concentrate and focus,” said Hsiao Tsai (小蔡), a 21-year-old inmate serving a 10-year sentence for robbery who is up for parole next year. The prison requested that the prisoners’ real names be withheld.

In addition to drumming, Hsiao Tsai and his fellow inmates, aged 18 to 25, have been learning meditation and qigong from U-Theatre member and instructor Ibau (伊苞), who visits the prison once a week.

She says her students have made “extremely fast progress.” Dubbed the Guwu Percussion Troupe (鼓舞打擊樂團), the inmates demonstrated their newly acquired skills last week at an open house event at Changhua Prison, which the Taipei Times attended along with a contingent of guests that included prison wardens from central Taiwan and Minister of Justice Wang Ching-feng (王清峰).

The Guwu drummers were granted permission last week to perform their first concert outside of the prison with U-Theatre. Tomorrow, the two groups will hold a free show at Changhua County Stadium (彰化縣立體育場).

“With this performance, we want people to know that even though [these inmates] committed crimes in the past, this doesn’t necessarily mean they will do wrong things for the rest of their lives,” said Changhua Prison warden Tai Shou-nan (戴壽南). “We hope to let society understand that prisons [are actually like] a school, with an educational structure.”
　

FERTILE GROUND FOR THE TRADITIONAL ARTS

U-Theatre was invited to teach a drumming class under a Changhua Prison program that encourages inmates to study traditional art forms such as nanguan (南管) and beiguan (北管) music and budaixi (布袋戲) puppetry.

The program was started two years ago by Patrick T.F. Lin (林田富), Director-General of the Changhua County Cultural Affairs Bureau, as a response to declining interest in traditional arts among youths.

Lin realized that a pool of potential talent could be found at Changhua Prison, where many of the inmates are young first-time offenders.

“Here you had a group of young people who couldn’t go anywhere,” he said. “And they had a lot of time to study whatever [the cultural bureau] could provide and arrange. Many of the inmates in the prison had nothing to do — they were bored.”

Lin received a positive response when he proposed the program to Changhua Prison, which had been looking for a way to accommodate a campaign by the Ministry of Justice for each of the nation’s prisons to possess “one distinctive characteristic” (一監所一特色).

In addition to music, the prison also offers courses on traditional handicrafts such as bamboo weaving and making paper lanterns, with all classes taught by established teachers from the area. The inmates’ work is available for sale at the prison.

Ideally inmates serving longer terms can eventually serve as teachers, said Lin, who hopes “one day this prison will become a center for the passing down of culture.”


A ‘TURNING POINT’

Tai, the prison warden, says “self-confidence” is one of the most valuable benefits inmates can gain from the traditional arts courses. As for the Guwu Percussion Troupe, he believes its members will look back at their experience with the U-Theatre class as a “turning point when their lives changed for the better.”

During their 15-minute outdoor showcase at Changhua Prison last week, the Guwu drummers proved themselves as highly capable performers. In spite of the cold and blustery weather, they displayed a sense of self-assuredness and composure in front of an audience made up mostly of the prison’s 2,700 inmates.

On stage, dressed in sarongs, the drummers looked like warrior-monks, leaping into the air and pounding thunderous beats on barrel-sized taiko drums as they landed in perfect unison. It was a fitting tribute to U-Theatre’s philosophy of maintaining calm amid chaos.

But even more striking was watching the drummers offstage after their performance. Underneath their face paint, which they wore to obscure their identities from the media, I saw expressions of pride mixed with youthful wonder and humility.

As they listened intently to U-Theatre artistic director Liu Ruo-yu (劉若瑀) and drumming director Huang Chih-chun (黃誌群) give them a post-performance pep talk and offer a few pointers for their upcoming show, it was easy to forget that they were prison inmates.

Ibau, the U-Theatre instructor, praised the Guwu drummers’ “diligence” and enthusiasm. Although they only have access to drums once a week, several inmates said that they practice whenever possible, often rehearsing rhythm patterns by beating on newspapers and magazines with chopsticks.

Hsiao Tsai says the classes have also taught the drummers the value of group unity. “When we first started, it sounded like 16 people beating 16 different drums,” he said. “Now, it sounds like 16 people beating one drum.”