icon
kmt logo block 正體中文 | 日本語
block
new icon  
img
title img
about kmt KMT Introduction Chairman's Biography Organization History Charter block
block
img
block block block KMT News block General News block Editorials block Survey block Opinions block block
header image

The Risks Involved in Acting Rashly of the New Southward Policy that You Didn’t Know

icon2018/04/16
iconBrowse:201

  The Risks Involved in Acting Rashly of the New Southward Policy that You Didn’t Know

 

United Daily News Editorial (Taipei, Taiwan)

April 7, 2018

 Translation of an Excerpt

 

Two things have happened recently, both sending warning signals to the "New Southward Policy," which the Tsai government has pushed for with all efforts. One is that eight Taiwan suspects, accused of smuggling narcotics, were indicted by Indonesian prosecutors who sought the death penalty; the defendants claimed innocence in court, saying they knew nothing about the accusations. The second is that People First Party (PFP) legislators urged that the Tsai government not cavalierly inject funds totaling close to NT$700 billion from the “National Agricultural Fund” into the Government Development Assistance Program (ODA), so as to avoid losing everything of the farmers' hard-earned money. The two things seem to be unrelated, but they both underscore the rash actions under the New Southward Policy, pushing the public to unknown risks.

 

Indonesia is one of the key countries in which President Tsai has been pushing for the New Southward Policy; however, the most notable linkage between Indonesia and Taiwan in recent years is not bilateral trade or cultural exchanges, but increasingly rampant drug smuggling. Indonesia being one case, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia and other countries all have similar problems. Last year, the Philippine President Duterte frequently pointed his finger at Taiwan, describing Taiwan triads and Philippine terrorists engaged in drug mongering, shipping massive quantities of narcotics to the Philippines, even inciting the terrorists to smoke amphetamines to boost their courage before fighting with Philippine government troops.

 

PFP legislators have recently questioned, saying the DPP demanded that the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) and the Council of Agriculture (COA) push for the establishment of an “Offshore Banking Unit” (OBU) from the funds of the “National Agricultural Fund”. Under this plan, capital of nearly NT$700 billion will be injected into the development aid in countries covered by the New Southward Policy, but with no content for the project whatsoever, even without rules for assessment or mechanisms for supervision. The PFP legislators are worried that this will become another disaster for the New Southward Policy. Although the National Agricultural Fund has denied that there is currently such a project, yet in view of the style of the Tsai government’s approach, once the political directives are issued, the National Agricultural Fund, we are afraid, will have no room for other choices.

 

In the last two years, the Tsai government has been pushing the New Southward Policy in a high profile and with great efforts; but the public have yet to see any concrete results, and the sequelae have become increasingly apparent. On the one hand, criminal activities on both sides have been increasing; Taiwan’s public have even violated the law involving capital punishment because they were not familiar with the local situations of other countries. On the other hand, the government has injected massive domestic funds into local public construction, while paying no attention to the risks. Is this the New Southward Policy we want?

iconAttachment : none 


Copyright©2024 Kuomintang Address: No.232~234, Sec. 2, BaDe Rd., Zhongshan District, Taipei City, Taiwan (ROC)  
image