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2012 ELECTIONS:
Hakkas unhappy with Wu’s stance
LINGUISTIC IMPERIALISM: Local Hakka leaders are
demanding that the KMT apologize for its suppression of languages other than
Mandarin during the Martial Law period
By Chris Wang / Staff Reporter
From left to right, Democratic
Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Huang Jen-shu, Taiwan Hakka Society president
Chang Yeh-shen and DPP legislative candidate Yang Chang-chen, held a press
conference in Taipei yesterday to criticize Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)
chairman Wu Po-hsiung’s “divisive” comments about DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen’s
Hakka-language abilities.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
Leaders from local Hakka groups yesterday
slammed former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Wu Po-hsiung (吳伯雄) for
calling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) a
“pseudo-Hakka” and demanded that the KMT apologize for what they called its past
policy of “linguistic genocide.”
Representatives from various groups and two DPP legislative candidates in Hakka
constituencies demanded that Wu — a Hakka — and President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九),
who doubles as KMT chairman, apologize for the party’s suppression of languages
other than Mandarin during the Martial Law era.
They also called for the establishment of a native language monument to remind
Taiwanese of the long period of suppression in Taiwan.
“Ma and Wu should be ashamed of themselves for being accomplices of the
suppression, a serious crime against humanity,” Taiwan Hakka Society chairman
Chang Yeh-shen (張葉森) said.
The leaders held the press conference in response to comments by Wu, who told a
rally in support of Ma’s re-election campaign on Sunday that Tsai was a “pseudo-
Hakka” because she could not speak Hakka and had not spoken it in more than 50
years.
Many people are not able to speak their mother tongue, such as Hakka, Hoklo
(also known as Taiwanese) or any of the Aboriginal languages because the KMT
only promoted Mandarin and prohibited the use of other languages for decades,
Chang said.
In 1988, Wu, who served as minister of the interior and was regarded as a top
Hakka politician at the time, and then-Cabinet member Ma did nothing to assist a
Hakka awareness movement that had emerged that year and did not stop the KMT
from the “Nazi-like” suppression of native languages and cultures, Chang said.
“It is ironic that now Wu is accusing people of not speaking fluent Hakka and Ma
is busy telling people that he is Hakka, when he is not,” Chang said.
What really matters to Hakka, the second-largest ethnic group in Taiwan behind
Hoklo, is whether a candidate is committed to promoting Hakka culture rather
than his or her language proficiency, said Yang Chang-chen (楊長鎮), a DPP
legislative candidate in Miaoli County.
“Ma, Wu and the KMT should look themselves in the mirror and think hard about
why [Taiwan] was able to preserve Hakka and Hoklo during the Japanese colonial
period [from 1895 to 1945], but it almost failed to survive the Martial Law
period,” Yang said.
Huang Jen-shu (黃仁杼), a DPP legislative candidate in Taoyuan County, said several
factors could contribute to or impair one’s Hakka proficiency, adding that lack
of language proficiency should never be regarded as a “cardinal sin.”
Huang said that if Wu failed to apologize for his comments, he did not rule out
organizing a protest in front of KMT headquarters.
The KMT would be the last political party to brag about its contribution to
Hakka people, Taiwanese Hakka Association of the World chairman Peter Lo (羅能平)
said.
“From what I’ve seen, the DPP established the Council for Hakka Affairs and the
Hakka Television Service and it was committed to promoting cultural diversity
during its eight years in power, while the KMT has done nothing in the past six
decades,” Lo said.
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