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EDITORIAL: Ma’s small
fib reveals big lie
The government is billing President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) visit to Africa and the
stopover he made in Mumbai, India, as the consequence of its much touted
“flexible diplomacy.” The stopover was the first time a president of the
Republic of China (ROC) stepped foot on Indian territory, and it owes much to
the hard work and achievements of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Center in
India. The problem is that the event was spoiled by the way the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs and the Presidential Office chose to handle it.
Diplomats and foreign affairs officials enjoy a certain amount of leeway in
terms of the accuracy of information they give on certain occasions, allowing
them to provide misinformation if it is believed to be in the national interest.
However, there are limits to how this privilege is applied, and discretion is
advised. Both the ministry and the Presidential Office need to be aware that
providing misinformation, while forgivable, comes at the risk of damaging the
government’s credibility, and must be avoided where possible.
The information given during the press conference in which the “goodwill” trip
was announced was that Ma’s plane would make a stop in Dubai to refuel. The
press was not informed of the change of plans until the plane was in the air. It
brings to mind the farcical confusion surrounding former president Chen
Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) trip in 2006 when he, indignant at having been refused
permission to make a stopover in Hawaii, instructed the plane to head west
without any clear destination, eventually making transit stops in Abu Dhabi and
Amsterdam en route to Paraguay and Costa Rica.
Conscious of the possibility of unwelcome comparisons, the Presidential Office
was at pains to say that plans for the Mumbai stopover were actually made two
weeks prior, and kept quiet both to avoid any interference from China and out of
respect to the Indian authorities. This was only a short two-hour refueling stop
and Ma and his entourage were looked after by local-level protocol officers —
there were no meetings with government officials or public events. Of course,
the government is not obliged to reveal every last detail, but neither was there
any need to damage the government’s credibility by providing misinformation to
the press and public.
It did so out of fear of intervention by Beijing. Ever since Ma took office in
2008 and his government began promoting its policy of a “diplomatic truce,”
China has continued to pressure Taiwan in its international activities. In every
corner, you find China squeezing Taiwan’s options.
The so-called diplomatic truce between China and Taiwan, as well as the truce
over affairs concerning overseas nationals, that Ma introduced in an effort to
ease relations between the two countries has been rather one-sided. China has
demonstrated on many occasions that it does not see the need to observe the
terms of the truce itself. Beijing has been rather unresponsive to Ma’s requests
for a bit of slack in foreign relations.
The Ma administration’s strategy has been to give cross-strait relations
precedence over relations with any other country. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office
has been making generous concessions to Taiwan, playing the role of “good cop”
to the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ “bad cop.” The latter has been
giving Taiwan a hard time on the international stage.
That the government felt the need to resort to covert tactics over fears of
China, even over the purely technical issue of having to refuel in Mumbai,
speaks volumes about the true state of cross-strait relations. It was a small
fib that revealed that the government’s diplomatic truce, where China is
concerned, is nothing but a huge lie.
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