Pressure
builds for Ma-Hu meet
WEARING DIFFERENT HATS: The Taipei mayor said that the president should arrange to meet with the Chinese president as soon as he becomes the chairman of the KMT
By Mo Yan-chih
STAFF REPORTER
Friday, Jun 12, 2009, Page 1
Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) yesterday urged President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to
prioritize cross-strait affairs after taking over as Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)
chairman and use the KMT-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) cross-strait forums to
arrange a meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤).
Ma announced at a press conference on Wednesday that he would run in the KMT
chairman election on July 26 to push for closer cooperation between the
government and the party. Ma is a shoo-in for the position after KMT Chairman Wu
Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) said at the same setting that he would not run for re-election.
Hau said cooperation between the government and the party was crucial, but the
most important mission for Ma as the next KMT chairman would be to push
cross-strait relations.
“The KMT-CCP forum has been the platform for leaders of the two sides to meet
and reach consensus on cross-strait affairs,” Hau said yesterday when meeting
reporters at Taipei City Hall.
“I believe cross-strait development will make more progress if President Ma
attends the KMT-CCP forum in his capacity as KMT chairman,” he said.
When asked whether or not he would attend the KMT-CCP forum and meet Hu after
taking over as KMT chairman, Ma said on Wednesday that he would not address the
issue until formally taking over the position in September.
Wu will attend this year’s KMT-CCP forum next month.
Ma will formally take over the chairmanship on Sept. 12 and serve until
September 2013.
Local media outlets speculated that a Ma-Hu meeting could be held in 2012 as
Hu’s term as CCP chairman will end in the same year and a KMT vice president
would attend the next forum.
KMT Legislator Lee Ching-hua (李慶華) yesterday urged the president to plan a
meeting with Hu as soon as possible after becoming KMT chairman, adding that a
meeting could promote “healthy cross-strait interaction.”
DPP Legislator Gao Jyh-peng (高志鵬) said on Wednesday that Ma wanted to use the
chairman position to promote quick unification with China.
China’s China Daily reported yesterday that “the prospects of the highest-level
talks between the mainland and Taiwan” had soared with Ma set to become the KMT
chairman.
“Although Ma has to visit Beijing in his capacity as KMT chairman and talk to Hu
in his role as general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, the unprecedented
meeting will signal ‘great reconciliation’ between the mainland and Taiwan,” it
said.
Cabinet
approves income tax for teachers, military
‘MILESTONE’: Doing away with tax exemptions in place for military personnel since 1944 and teachers since 1979 may add NT$15.5 billion to the state coffers
By Shih Hsiu-chuan
STAFF REPORTER
Friday, Jun 12, 2009, Page 1
“It is very funny that the KMT now realizes the DPP had the right policies.
Back then it strongly opposed the idea.”— Tsai Huang-liang, Democratic
Progressive Party legislator
The Cabinet yesterday approved a package of proposals to reinstate income taxes
for military personnel and teachers at the junior high school level and below
while increasing allowances to compensate for losses caused by the tax.
Eliminating the tax exemption for teachers and military personnel will be a
“milestone in the country’s tax history,” Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) said,
adding that the government hoped to implement the new measures at the beginning
of next year.
Executive Yuan Spokesman Su Jun-pin (蘇俊賓) yesterday quoted Liu as saying that
the proposed amendments were a move toward a fairer tax system.
Related amendments to the Income Tax Act (所得稅法), the Compilation and Management
of the Education Expenditure Act (教育經費編列與管理法) and the Kindergarten Education Act
(幼稚教育法) will now be referred to the legislature for review.
The Ministry of Finance said that as about 320,000 people are currently exempted
from paying income tax — including kindergarten, elementary school and junior
high school teachers, as well as military personnel — their income tax payments
are expected to add NT$15.5 billion (US$473.81 million) annually to national
coffers.
The additional tax revenue will be used to improve the education environment
instead of being used by the national treasury for other purposes, Su said.
Under the complementary measures, the Ministry of Education (MOE) will increase
subsidies for elementary schools and junior high schools, hiring more
administrative personnel and reducing the number of class hours allotted to
teachers to lessen their workload.
Faculty members in elementary schools and junior high schools who serve as class
advisers will receive higher pay, the MOE said in the proposal.
Kindergarten teachers are expected to receive higher allowances on top of their
salary.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of National Defense will increase the extra subsidies
currently given to military personnel for duty-related activities, on top of
their monthly salary.
Military personnel and teachers have enjoyed tax-free status since 1944 and 1979
respectively as the then government wanted to look after special professional
groups and encourage people to devote themselves to such jobs then.
National Teachers Association president Kevin Wu (吳忠泰) yesterday lauded the
Executive Yuan’s plan to cancel the tax breaks.
“The tax exemptions for teachers at junior high and elementary schools and
kindergartens were introduced a long time ago,” Wu said. “We support the
proposed amendment to the Income Tax Act approved by the Executive Yuan and are
thankful that the Executive Yuan respects the need for the Ministry of Education
and teachers’ organizations to negotiate changes in teachers’ working
conditions.”
Also lauding the measure, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Tsai
Huang-liang (蔡煌郎) yesterday said the idea was pitched during the DPP era.
“It is very funny that the KMT now realizes the DPP had the right policies. Back
then it strongly opposed the idea. The KMT is taking the credit for the DPP’s
work,” he said.
Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲), another DPP lawmaker, asked why, if the KMT felt this was
the right course of action, did the party boycott it four years ago when Ma was
KMT chairman?
“If you look at the text, it is almost a carbon copy of the version we pitched
four years ago. The KMT wasted four years before doing the right thing,” she
said.
Turning a
blind eye to oppression
Friday, Jun 12, 2009, Page 8
‘The CCP has signed several human rights covenants and action plans, which Ma
describes as China’s willingness to face the issue of human rights and the
embodiment of openness and self-confidence. This is simply a joke.’
In 1989, hundreds of thousands of students, workers and others crowded into
Tiananmen Square to demand that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) reform itself.
Then-paramount leader Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平) gave orders to crack down, and on June
4, the People’s Liberation Army dispatched tanks and troops armed with machine
guns and opened fired on unarmed people in the square. Many civilians were
injured or killed in the resulting bloodbath, which has become known as the
Tiananmen Square Massacre.
The bloody suppression of the protest has helped the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
retain power. But since that time communist parties throughout Eastern Europe
and the former Soviet Union have been dumped onto the trash pile of history due
to pressures of democratization from mass movements.
The Tiananmen Square Massacre was condemned by all developed nations. Taiwan’s
then-president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) spoke out in support of justice.
China, however, has always insisted that this tragedy was a case of
“counterrevolutionary turmoil” caused by a minority of miscreants. It has been
unwilling to reveal the truth about the incident and rehabilitate those who
suffered or died as a result of it.
Every year, many democratic nations, politicians, activists and non-governmental
groups release statements and hold events to show support for those who suffered
as a result of June 4 in a bid to ensure the CCP cannot escape responsibility
for its bloody history.
Before he was elected president, Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was one of those who spoke
out in support of those who suffered as a result of the massacre. Every year, he
would publish an article on June 4 in memory of the tragedy and to demand the
movement’s rehabilitation by the CCP.
Ma used to rely on statements about the massacre to gain media coverage, but
after becoming president, he has chosen to side with those in power. He used a
bunch of excuses to cover up for his unwillingness to meet with the former
leaders of the June 4 democracy movement and then decided to visit Central
America and not return to Taiwan until the night of June 4 in an apparent
attempt to ignore the intolerable legacy of the events in Tiananmen Square.
Ma’s is free to forget June 4, treat it in a perfunctory manner and distance
himself from it. He has given speeches and made statements to justify his new
position, but amazingly, these speeches and statements have praised the CCP’s
development and openness.
Last year, for example, Ma’s June 4 speech contained no criticism of the CCP’s
use of force to suppress the protests or any mention of being anti-communist but
not anti-China. On the contrary, he complimented the CCP for the way in which it
dealt with the Sichuan earthquake the previous month, praising the speed at
which the Chinese authorities rescued victims, the care they showed them and the
openness of media reporting on demonstrations about the earthquake.
In his “Observations on the 20th Anniversary of the June 4th Incident” this
year, Ma’s praise of the CCP was more earnest. There were no comments about how
there would be no basis for cross-strait unification if China continued to
refuse to rehabilitate the June 4 protesters.
Instead, Ma displayed a slave mentality, saying: “Great changes have taken place
on both sides of the Taiwan Strait in the two decades since the June 4 Incident.
Successful economic reforms in mainland China have brought tremendous
improvements to the quality of life there. Over the past decade, the mainland
authorities have paid greater attention to human rights than before. China has
signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and ratified
the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. In addition,
it has published a series of white papers on human rights, and just this past
April took an even more concrete step forward by formally adopting the National
Human Rights Action Plan of China” and how “this shows a robust openness and
confidence on their part, the likes of which we have not seen from them in the
past.”
Ma will doubtless use such rhetoric in the future to defend dictatorship. The
CCP has signed several human rights covenants and action plans, which Ma
describes as China’s willingness to face the issue of human rights and the
embodiment of openness and self-confidence. This is simply a joke.
Many countries have constitutions unequivocally guaranteeing the human rights
and freedom of its citizens. However, a constitution must be acted on, otherwise
all the ideals and promises in the world are just empty talk.
The same Constitution that governed Taiwan during the Martial Law era governs
today’s democracy, with clauses that protect human rights and freedom. However,
when these clauses conflicted with totalitarian instruments such as the Taiwan
Garrison Command and the intelligence network, they weren’t worth the paper they
were written on.
Dictators are especially fond of talking about “the people” and “democracy,” but
when they want to lock up their opponents, human rights articles become
disposable.
Taiwanese who lived through the authoritarian era understand the meaning and the
truth of these simple concepts and historical facts.
How can it be that Ma does not?
It is both tragic and shameless for Ma to defend China by saying that Beijing
has signed key human rights covenants when he knows that doing so will not in
itself bring freedom and democracy.
June 4 is not all Ma wants to forget. He believes that words and clauses in
human rights covenants equal real democracy. The democracy and human rights
clauses in the Republic of China Constitution are being used by the Ma
administration to cover up its anti-democratic and anti-human rights practices.
Ma’s “Observations on the 20th Anniversary of the June 4th Incident” clearly
illustrate sympathy for the lot of the authoritarian ruler.