The Ruling Party Is a Half-Beat behind the Opposition in Planning Measures for Salvaging Industries in Predicament

 The Ruling Party Is a Half-Beat behind the Opposition in Planning Measures for Salvaging Industries in Predicament

United Daily News Editorial (Taipei, Taiwan)

February 11, 2020

 Translation of an Excerpt

The Centers for Disease Control, on January 20, established the "Central Epidemic Command Center", which has just completed three weeks. The Cabinet, however, only yesterday convoked a conference on planning measures for salvaging the industries in predicament in the face of the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic; the response was obviously delayed. In contrast, the KMT legislative caucus introduced a bill ten days ago, referencing the approach during the SARS epidemic, proposing a special statute for salvaging the industries in predicament, amounting to NT$50 billion; it seems that this has better grasped the dynamic of society and the tempo for dealing with the epidemic.

With respect to dealing with this epidemic, the ruling party showed tardiness, possibly for two reasons. From the objective angle, the government first underestimated the epidemic situation, believing that it could cope with it easily, not knowing its impact would far exceed what had been estimated earlier, thus even the supply of face masks and the control of personnel entry both demonstrated shortcomings, not to speak of economic impacts. From the subjective angle, the DPP has too many calculations. Internally, the DPP does not want to follow up the KMT bill, in order to prevent the opposition from scoring on this point. Externally, the DPP, on the other hand, is waiting for opportunities to bash the PRC, thus, it played successive gambits in the matter of ferrying Taiwan residents home, leading to large numbers of them stranded on the Mainland. Precisely because of the vehement propensity of the DPP for battle, this has shadowed its vision for caring for the people and stabilizing the economy.

The KMT bill may not necessarily be the best version, but it absolutely contains points worthy of reference for the DPP. If the Tsai government continues to procrastinate, it could find itself in a deep quagmire.

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