China Unduly Influencing Taiwan

[Fox]

It was crawling, literally crawling, with Chinese tour groups, sadly the same was true for Confucious Temple, Taipei 101 and other tourist sites we visited over election weekend,

I'm gonna call BS on that one. I very much doubt it was literally crawling with Chinese tour groups. Wouldn't that be a little uncomfortable, not to mention inconvenient, and slow? It would also make seeing the exhibits very difficult and Chinese don't like the Japanese stepping over them ever, let alone the odd fat German.

[Betelnut]

As far as I know for China Airlines, extra flights were added during the election weekend causing flight attendants difficulty in voting. This would allow for the usual tour groups as well as the business people to make it back.

The legislative election was held in Dec. 2007 last time if memory serves correctly. The goal was to combine the 2 elections, so the election was held in between Dec. and March.

While everyone knows, the PRC is using economic means to get what it wants, it should also be understood that Wang Dan has essentially been a critic of the KMT getting close to the mainland etc. because he just wants to get back at the CCP for what happened to him. Many of the former Tiananmen crowd generally side with the DPP in Taiwan automatically because it is against the CCP. It does not have much to do with issues between the blue and green camps in Taiwan.

Anyway, the country's population is biased towards the North as it is. If people's registration is in the Central and the South, it's a little inconvenient for them to travel back and perhaps work on the same day. One of my friends was serious enough about voting to go back to Taichung just to vote and then rush back to Taipei to work. If people are serious enough about voting, they will do inconvenient things.

Younger people in college, etc. who are voting for the first time, just don't take things as seriously and will not make as much of an effort to go back and vote. If this is the case, the DPP shouldn't depend on this demographic and think about what the 30-50 age group wants which is to make sure they are making money and all that.

It's already very obvious that the mainland has strongly influenced this election. After getting goodies, signing ECFA, and getting cross straight flights, people who care about those things will naturally be afraid of losing them if a PRC hostile political party were to take office. The support rate for the 2 camps is about 54-46 +/- 1 or 2 %, but the '92 consensus and all that seemed to dominate the theme of the election and basically discredits the DPP when it comes time to decide.

There is a lot more information out there in Chinese about how China is unduly influencing Taiwanese politics, but there is at least some English information available.

I just wanted to share with you guys some of the "conspiracy theories" certain people have, that is not available in English:

- The KMT had the election in January, rather than March as usual, because they wanted to obliterate the Green strongholds of the South. Basically, for college/university students studying in Taipei that support Green, they'd have to go back South in order to cast their ballots... but, one week before Chinese New Year's and during exam time?! Undoable for many, impractical for most. On the other hand, students that support Blue are already at home in Blue strongholds of Taipei... and even if Taichung, not very far. The voter turnout for northern cities was close to 75%, whereas Tainan, for example, was only 68%.

- China stopped allowing tourists to come to Taiwan in the weeks up to the election, probably for two reasons. The first reason is so that "Taishang" (Taiwanese businessmen conducting business in China) would have flights to get back and vote Blue. The other reason being that they didn't want their people to see democracy in action... although, that's blatant, it's no conspiracy.

- And the most sinister conspiracy: Hu Jintao was given a mandate and a team to reunify Taiwan by peaceful and economic means by the end of Ma's second term. Barring that, they would result to force. Ma is playing right into their hands, as are the Taiwanese business leaders - such as HTC's Sherry Wang or Foxconn's Terry Gou - who publicly declared their support of the KMT. Why would business leaders do such an un-businesslike thing? Pressure from China. Threats from China.

Here's a great article to read: http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/ ... 2003523512

The Chinese democracy activist mentioned in the article, Wang Dan, has some great pieces in the Chinese version of the Taipei Times (The Liberty Times) about how China is using economic factors to influence Taiwan, how Taiwanese are already starting to self-censor, etc.

Is it about time to move to a new country?!?!

[Cueball]

- The KMT had the election in January, rather than March as usual, because they wanted to obliterate the Green strongholds of the South. Basically, for college/university students studying in Taipei that support Green, they'd have to go back South in order to cast their ballots... but, one week before Chinese New Year's and during exam time?! Undoable for many, impractical for most. On the other hand, students that support Blue are already at home in Blue strongholds of Taipei... and even if Taichung, not very far. The voter turnout for northern cities was close to 75%, whereas Tainan, for example, was only 68%.

300 000 expat Taiwanese returned to Taiwan in order to vote. If they can make it back here, some flying in from the US or Europe to vote, university students can certainly jump on a bus to southern Taiwan if need be.

There is an important difference. These are expats who returned regardless of the generic inconvenience of travelling to Taiwan. I do not believe that the date in question was especially inconvenient for them. Whereas it's arguable that the date of the election made it more inconvenient for students to travel home to the south just for the election.

Can anyone confirm with certainty when Taiwanese university students break up for the holidays and if there is an absolute final exam date for everyone (and if so what it is)?

Bus / train / HSR / plane from Taipei to the south Friday night, vote Saturday morning, return Saturday evening if necessary. No problem, no major inconvenience.

You've ignored my comment. I'm not saying it's IMPOSSIBLE or even ALWAYS inconvenient. I'm saying that the TIMING may have been inconvenient. And there's also an argument that voting should be convenient, not a mission of having to travel to one end of the country to the other.

I agree that it should be as convenient as possible. However the date has been known for a long time and there's nothing stopping students ensuring they are registered where they live rather than where they are from. They had plenty of time to arrange that.

Having two elections on one day actually makes it more convenient as only one trip home is required.

And you know full well that if Tsai won, no one in the dpp would be complaining about timing or inconvenience.

There's some info I'm not sure on/forgotten so - i) How long does it take to change where one's registered to vote? ii) Are there any restrictions on doing so? iii) When was the date announced.

I have never commented on the fact both elections were on the same day.

I believe that concerns about the date were made way before the election, whether it was by the DPP or other groups.

If people are serious enough about voting, they will do inconvenient things.

In that case, make it equally inconvenient for everyone to vote. Otherwise it's unfair for it to be easy for some and harder for others. As I said in my last post, voting should be as convenient as possible.

[Hamletintaiwan]

Not sure about the college students, but I can tell you of 50 contractors (laborers), supervisors and a couple of engineers who worked for me on Saturday instead of heading home to vote since they will not be working during CNY, hence making no money. And I tell you, the plants were loaded with workers who all worked that day to make up for the missed worked coming up, busiest Saturday I have seen in a long time. I am not sure how many would've voted if they would have went home as they normally do on Fridays/Saturday morning, but it is a fairly hot topic these past few days

This sounds like a more legitimate complaint. However, hard to say how those workers would have voted. The Taipei Times whine was that students, being younger and more idealistic, tend to vote DPP, while older and more "pragmatic" folks (with their minds sharply focused on their pocketbooks) are more likely to vote KMT.

Let's think about this for a long time and then----
People who can't afford taking a day off for election day.
People from the south, not Taipei.
People who eventually were hired for this week only and are unemployed otherwise.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_China_presidential_election,_2004

[Hamletintaiwan]

- The KMT had the election in January, rather than March as usual, because they wanted to obliterate the Green strongholds of the South. Basically, for college/university students studying in Taipei that support Green, they'd have to go back South in order to cast their ballots... but, one week before Chinese New Year's and during exam time?! Undoable for many, impractical for most. On the other hand, students that support Blue are already at home in Blue strongholds of Taipei... and even if Taichung, not very far. The voter turnout for northern cities was close to 75%, whereas Tainan, for example, was only 68%.

300 000 expat Taiwanese returned to Taiwan in order to vote. If they can make it back here, some flying in from the US or Europe to vote, university students can certainly jump on a bus to southern Taiwan if need be.

This is really speculation only.
300 000 Taiwanese returned for the traditional holidays and most people flew a little early because the flights were cheaper.
Comparing a bunch of rich motherf. flying first class with some hard working students or workers who hardly can earn a living is no argument for unfairness at all.

[cfimages]

There's some info I'm not sure on/forgotten so - i) How long does it take to change where one's registered to vote? ii) Are there any restrictions on doing so? iii) When was the date announced.

i) Not sure exactly, but when my wife changed her registration from Taichung to Taipei county before we got married it didn't take her much more than a few minutes (not including waiting in line time).

ii)No idea but I can't see why there would be.

iii)If I remember correctly, it was announced last summer.

[cfimages]

- The KMT had the election in January, rather than March as usual, because they wanted to obliterate the Green strongholds of the South. Basically, for college/university students studying in Taipei that support Green, they'd have to go back South in order to cast their ballots... but, one week before Chinese New Year's and during exam time?! Undoable for many, impractical for most. On the other hand, students that support Blue are already at home in Blue strongholds of Taipei... and even if Taichung, not very far. The voter turnout for northern cities was close to 75%, whereas Tainan, for example, was only 68%.

300 000 expat Taiwanese returned to Taiwan in order to vote. If they can make it back here, some flying in from the US or Europe to vote, university students can certainly jump on a bus to southern Taiwan if need be.

This is really speculation only.
300 000 Taiwanese returned for the traditional holidays and most people flew a little early because the flights were cheaper.
Comparing a bunch of rich motherf. flying first class with some hard working students or workers who hardly can earn a living is no argument for unfairness at all.

Assuming you are correct and they'd have all been flying back for CNY anyway, then it saves them the trouble of having to fly back again in March for an election. It actually makes it easier for that 300 000 to vote.

As I said in an earlier post here, the date was announced well in advance of the election and workers etc could quite easily have changed their registration to reflect where they are living rather than where they are from. If all the workers from the south who live in the north were registered where they live, the greens may have won in the north.