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Feb 23, 2009

228 madness

Ma pledges to seek consensus on major ethnic issues

The [228 Memorial] foundation was critical of the Ma administration after the legislature, dominated by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), froze its budget last year and then refused to grant a budget for this year.

Ma, who has been seeking support from 228 Incident victims since serving as Taipei mayor, said the government would make up for the previous budget cuts by providing an annual budget starting next year and vowed to continue funding the foundation until the government had paid the NT$1.5 billion the foundation had been promised by the previous administration.

Wang said the president also asked the Executive Yuan to apply to the legislature to unfreeze the 2007 budget for the foundation.
Wow, taking the tough line in this issue I see.

5 comments:

Tim Maddog said...

The Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) "tough line" is that they'll do anything to try to take credit for this (before freezing the budget again, probably).

And don't you wonder if the recent suggestion by KMT legislator Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇) that 228 Memorial Day (二二八和平紀念日) be canceled was yet another attempt to make people think Ma Ying-jeou is on the victims' side?

Tim Maddog

Taiwan Echo said...

On the surface, Ma Ying-jeou always shows the determination to uphold the law, to pursuit social justice, to maintain judiciary impartiality ...

But you will find that it's all sweet talk. In the end nothing will be done, or even is done the other way, but Ma still shameless repeats all that sweet talks.

In the current 228 tough line, I bet Ma just said that before the coming 228 Memorial Day. I bet he will turn his face around after then. He would argue that he has done what he can, it's not his fault.

Lets wait and see.

阿牛 said...

What's funny for me is the KMT already decided to change the name of Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall back to Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall; but now they're saying "Oh, we'll hold a public forum on the issue to get a social consensus." If the decision is already made, which it is, and already starting to be implemented, what's the point? It's laughable.

Tim Maddog said...

A-gu, you wrote:
- - -
If the decision is already made, which it is, and already starting to be implemented, what's the point?
- - -

The point is -- and everybody needs to be able to say this out loud every time they see it happening -- that for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), this kind of behavior is always about appearances, appearances, and nothin' but appearances.

Tim Maddog

Taiwan Echo said...

a-gu:"but now they're saying "Oh, we'll hold a public forum on the issue to get a social consensus." If the decision is already made, which it is, and already starting to be implemented, what's the point?"

They did exactly the same thing during the Strawberry Movement last November when students requested the Assembly and Parade Act (APA) be improved. They (I believe it's Ministry of Interior Affair 內政部) held a forum, but invited only those opposed the law changes, and made a conclusion that "scholars all opposed the law changes at this moment."

I believe it's the tricks they will apply this time. They will just invite people who will give only softballs to voucher for them, and eventually made a conclusion that ALL TAIWANESE agree with CECA or anything alike.

Like Tim Maddog said, it's all appearance. That's the single one thing I hate most about Chinese culture -- everything is deception, the entire society is a deception, and they are so blatant to do it with so much disregard to the laws.