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EDITORIAL: Building
castles in the air
Now that the presidential candidates for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and
the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) have been decided, the rumblings of
preparations for battle can be felt. Concerned about his low popularity ratings,
President Ma Ying-jeou (°¨^¤E) has thrust himself into the front line, taking a
much more prominent role in decisionmaking, beyond his constitutional remit.
Meanwhile, the man who should be doing this, Premier Wu Den-yih (§d´°¸q), has been
momentarily sidelined.
While it is true that Ma has spearheaded many new policies of late, these have
been rushed through, and not given the careful consideration they deserve.
There¡¦s no telling whether they will have their intended effect, or do his
re-election bid any good.
Last month, the president personally announced that he was withdrawing his
support for the construction of Kuokuang Petrochemical Technology Co¡¦s naphtha
cracker, in a bid to put an end to the war of words between supporters of
industrial development and environmental groups. Knowing that moderate voters
tend to support environmental issues, Ma ditched his administration¡¦s support
for the economic development side of the debate. All he was concerned about was
preventing his support base from shrinking and losing any more of the crucial
central Taiwan vote.
Despite the financial abyss that the government is facing, Ma is going ahead
with plans to increase salaries for public servants by 3 percent, and recently
added raising the minimum wage to his plans. Businesses are not happy, but Ma is
pushing for a raise in the third quarter. With a strengthening New Taiwan dollar
cutting into many businesses¡¦ profits, it is unlikely that companies will want
to follow suit, dashing the government¡¦s hopes of inspiring a commensurate rise
in salaries in the private sector.
Then there is the question of rising oil prices. Didn¡¦t Ma, during his 2008
presidential campaign, accuse the DPP of interfering with gas prices and not
respecting market forces? Well, now he¡¦s talking of subsidizing oil prices. So
what if it will cost billions of NT dollars every year? Who cares that it goes
against the principle of fairness, or the government policy of conserving energy
resources? What¡¦s more, the government is now talking of a mechanism of
staggered subsidy increases.
Ma then sallied forth to drum up support among rice farmers, promising them he
would increase the agreed purchasing price for rice. This will see the market
price increase, but it is not yet rice harvesting season, so it will be the
suppliers ¡X not the farmers ¡X who benefit. Caterers, restaurateurs and consumers
will all fall foul of the market price increases.
It¡¦s all about garnering votes. Any policy likely to be a vote-earner, the
government jumps at. Who cares if the policy is likely to have drawbacks? So
long as they won¡¦t be too conspicuous, or indeed be noticed before the election,
the government is happy to see them through now, and deal with the consequences
later. Anything that is likely to cost Ma votes, or which may be controversial,
has to be nipped in the bud, no matter what the department responsible for the
policy has to say about it.
A perfect example of the government¡¦s hasty approach to introducing populist
policies is the fast-tracking of the luxury tax. For the vast majority, however,
it¡¦s a little bit too much like Christmas for comfort. One day of sugar-coated
extravagance followed by a thud back to normality, with the electorate left to
pay the consequences.
Voters are well aware of Ma¡¦s electioneering tactics and propaganda, having gone
through the 2008 presidential election campaign and almost three years of his
presidency. Now that Ma is eyeing a second term, voters should ask themselves
whether their lives have improved appreciably in the last three years. We all
know the answer to that question.
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