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Ma appears happy to emasculate Taiwan
By Steve Wang 王思為
Tuesday, Feb 02, 2010, Page 8
Seeing talks on a proposed cross-strait economic cooperation framework agreement
(ECFA) as negotiations between one “area” and another, President Ma Ying-jeou
(馬英九) has taken it upon himself to relegate international trade relations that
should be dealt with under the WTO framework to the domestic level. In doing so,
he has demoted Taiwan to the status of a local administrative region. This is
totally unacceptable.
Those in charge of government policy even try to cover up the reality of how
Taiwan’s sovereignty is being diminished by quoting the Act Governing Relations
Between Peoples of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例). They
are barefaced liars who are unwilling to take responsibility for this travesty
that is selling Taiwan down the river.
Countries around the world sign free-trade agreements as they wish, under the
WTO framework. If disputes arise, they can be mediated by seeking the mediation
channels laid out by the WTO.
Now that the Ma administration is happily accepting the ECFA framework that
makes such disputes a domestic matter, Taiwan will not even have recourse to the
WTO should disputes arise. If this ECFA does not involve a loss of sovereignty
for Taiwan, what does? In addition, negotiations between the Straits Exchange
Foundation and the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait are all
conducted on the precondition of recognizing Ma’s beloved “one China, with each
side having its own interpretation.”
Article 1 of the Act Governing Relations Between Peoples of the Taiwan Area and
the Mainland Area, absurd as the law may be, clearly states: “This Act is
specially enacted for the purposes of ensuring the security and public welfare
in the Taiwan Area, regulating dealings between the peoples of the Taiwan Area
and the Mainland Area, and handling legal matters arising therefrom before
national unification.”
Setting aside the matter of whether “before national unification” has any
significance in reality, the question is, how can a sovereign nation’s economic
and trade relations be governed by a law that regulates “relations between
peoples” of two areas?
That law is bizarre, just like the now defunct Temporary Provisions Effective
during the Period of the Communist Rebellion (動員戡亂時期臨時條款), which flouted the
spirit of a constitutional system.
The Ma administration has no intention of reviewing this law that threatens to
erase the Republic of China (ROC) without a constitutional basis. Not only are
Ma and his government emasculating the ROC’s sovereignty; they are fooling
themselves and the public, and are happy to do so.
Steve Wang is an advisory committee member of Taiwan Thinktank.
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