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EDITORIAL: Taiwan
needs answers, not riddles
President Ma Ying-jeou (°¨^¤E) posted a message on his Facebook page several days
ago, discussing Taiwan¡¦s competitiveness and posing three questions, which the
media have taken to calling ¡§Ma¡¦s three conundrums.¡¨ He asked why Taiwan trails
other countries in the speed of completion of public construction projects,
questioned the nation¡¦s English language abilities and promoted trade
liberalization, saying these issues were holding Taiwan back. Well, Taiwanese
would also like to know the answers to these conundrums.
It has been several days since Ma posted his queries, but we have seen no sign
of a response from the government. It is OK, Ma, we understand: the answer is
blowing in the wind.
The president correctly identified the problems, but he seems to be confused
about who should be asking the questions and who should be finding the answers.
If Ma were a football coach, and government officials the players, it would be
like his team losing a stretch of games and, rather than looking for the root of
the problem or discussing new tactics with his team, and Ma turning to the crowd
and saying: ¡§What¡¦s going on?¡¨
Ma has been in power for five years. If public construction projects are
completed slower than in other countries, he should be asking the premier to sit
down with departments heads, such as officials from the Public Construction
Commission, and getting them to hammer out a solution.
Figuring out how to reduce red tape and corruption would be good places to
start. The key to improving efficiency in this sector lies in the hands of Ma
and his premier: If they screw up, who else is there to blame?
On trade liberalization, Ma lamented that over the past decade South Korea has
signed more free-trade agreements (FTAs) than Taiwan has. Three years ago, when
he signed the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) with China, Ma
waxed lyrical about how the pact would make it easier for Taiwan to sign FTAs.
Three years on, the public would like to ask Ma what else he has accomplished.
Is it that he was taken for a ride and China has no intention of allowing Taiwan
to sign FTAs? Or has he been dragging his feet and not trying to get other
countries to sign agreements with Taiwan?
Ma¡¦s administration has been overly pro-China, ignoring the rest of the world.
Taiwanese have been swarming to China, with fewer people going to the West to
study or to do business. Students and working people alike have less of a sense
of the importance, or desirability, of an international outlook. Taiwan lacks
English-speaking environments and there is often little need for English in
schools, homes or workplaces.
With a lack of pressure to learn to speak English in the education system, it is
not surprising that the overall standard of the nation¡¦s English lags behind
other countries.
Ma¡¦s ¡§three conundrums¡¨ are much like Premier Jiang Yi-huah¡¦s (¦¿©y¾ì) comments
about the moribund economy. The government is both the problem and the solution.
Broken campaign promises are either blamed on the previous government or on the
difficult global situation, otherwise they are just forgotten.
All talk and no action, government officials appear oblivious to the fact that
they are responsible for governing the country. When the initial clamor dies
down, the media will move on to the next hot issue and the problems are
temporarily forgotten.
Ma controls the state and Taiwan¡¦s competitiveness is in the government¡¦s hands.
If a nation is not competitive, the fault lies not with the population, but with
the government¡¦s inability to do its job properly.
If this point is lost on Ma, then he well deserves The Economist¡¦s label of
¡§ineffectual bumbler.¡¨
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