Tsai’s separatist gimmicks

Since taking office, Tsai Ing-wen and her colleagues have made a series of moves to push for “Taiwan independence”, from limiting cross-Straits cultural exchanges and not holding any commemorative activities to mark the 80 th anniversary of the July 7 Incident of 1937, which heralded the start of Japan’s undeclared war against China and nationwide Chinese resistance against the aggressors, to, most recently, introducing a high school textbook revision in which the Chinese mainland is included in the section on East Asia history.

The attempts of the separatists to “de-sinify” the island emerged at the end of the last century during Lee Teng-hui’s tenure as head of the island’s administration. And his successor, Chen Shui-bian sought to culturally divorce the island from the motherland. Since taking office in May last year, Tsai and her colleagues have denied the 1992 Consensus that recognizes one China, and taken academic and educational measures in an undisguised manner to deliberately try to change the island’s local identity to a “national identity”.

However, the efforts made to move Taiwan farther along the road of “independence” have not produced the expected results. Tsai’s refusal to uphold the 1992 Consensus on one China has sabotaged the political foundation for cross-Straits peace and development and “squeezed” the space available for the island’s economic growth.

Without enjoying the same dividends from the mainland’s economic development as it did under the administration of her predecessor, Ma Ying-jeou, Taiwan faces harsher economic difficulties than before. As a result, Tsai’s approval rating has considerably declined.

The current moves on the island to pursue “de-sinification” are only gimmicks of Tsai and her fellow separatists, who if they had the best interests of the island’s residents at heart would face up to the fact the island is part of one China.