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A bloodless revolution
The joint hands of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Beijing continue to probe
and lay bare all the faultiness of Taiwan’s majority-embraced informal
sovereignty — aka “status quo.”
And, the score on Taiwanese’s humiliation continues to mount. The latest
incident involved 14 Taiwanese who were deemed stateless by the government of
the Philippines and extradited to China for allegedly having committed fraud
against Chinese individuals.
Even though Ma’s almost three-year China tilt might have exacerbated and
accelerated the demise of that illusion of a sovereign nation, politicking in
Taiwan, including the next legislative and presidential elections, carries on
under the same umbrella, thereby seemingly perpetuating the make-believe.
This might explain why, while people felt deeply frustrated and disappointed
with Ma’s defense of Taiwan’s sovereignty and his failure at stopping its
erosion, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) leadership seemed reluctant to
exploit the political opportunity despite its steadfast advocacy of a separate
Taiwan.
However, given the fact that only Taiwanese collectively can stem that tide and
the fact that, thanks to Ma, the momentum for taking the next step in Taiwan’s
democracy appears to be surging, the DPP leadership should figure out a way to
fully engage the public in that very endeavor now.
Besides, the urgency of the matter is lost on no one, considering the general
consensus that Ma would doubtlessly take Taiwan to a point of no return if given
a second term.
Thus, the time has come for the DPP to lay out a detailed road map for building
formal sovereignty through democratic processes and offer it to the voters prior
to the next election season as part of a widely published document — in the
spirit of a contract with Taiwan — that itemizes in black and white what the DPP
commits to accomplish in the subsequent four years if voters would hand the
reins of both the legislature and the presidency to it. It should bear
signatures of all DPP candidates for both institutions, making it a modern day
declaration of sovereignty — Taiwanese style.
This would then emerge as the starting point — if not the bulk — for the DPP’s
design regarding the Taiwan-China relationship.
The weightiness of such a contract would be evidenced by the ferocity of the
gathering opposition both internally and externally.
However, absent conspicuously will be any open criticism from the only source
that really counts in this struggle: the US — contrasting sharply to
Washington’s turbulent responses to former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁)
verbal outbursts. That is because Washington would understand this high-stakes
Taiwanese exercise in democracy and attempt at extracting the maximum advantage
of democracy.
If the West were ambivalent on the developments in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya
despite all the violence, it would be a welcome relief if Taiwan can complete a
bloodless revolution.
HUANG JEI-HSUAN
Los Angeles, California
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