2016-6-20 [examiner.com] Controversial Taiwan Civil Government moves to center stage in sovereignty drama
▲ Taiwan Civil Government parades in Taipei led by Black Bear squad
The China Post has published a call for the United States and Japan to explain their relationship to the Taiwan Civil Government organization. A June 20 editorial questioning the United States about the group follows angry street protests outside a TCG office over its anti-China stance. The editorial reviewed the history of TCG and dubbed it a rival government of the Republic of China in-exile.
The unresolved international status of Taiwan since the end of World War II has created a myriad of groups dedicated to Taiwnaese independence from the US-imposed ROC government. The way to the future for the island of 23 million people is clouded to the point no one can even agree on the name. Older island residents still talk of Formosa, as it was called when the decades-long strategic ambiguity began at war's end. Younger people have adopted Taiwan. ROC President Tsai Ing-wen has said that Taiwan equals the Republic of China but she accepts Chinese Taipei, which the Peoples' Republic of China insists is the correct name.
Taiwan Civil Government was founded in February 2008 by Roger Lin, a former associate of two ROC presidents, Lee Teng-hui and Chen Shui-bian. Lin is passionate about his dislike of the Kuomintang which imposed four decades of cruel martial law on the island. Despite Lin's opposition to China, his critics see Lin as an opportunist who takes advantage of Taiwan’s unresolved status.
Though not a qualified political party, the TCG is a defacto government that has made Taoyuan its capital. TCG has governors for six districts, Taipei, Hsinchu Taichung, Tainan, Kaohsiung and Yilan. The TCG has issued identity cards, formed a quasi-military “Black Bear” squad, and conducts training sessions on democracy. However, it is the group's use of federal courts in the United States that may prove its most important activity.
Former ROC Justice Minister Cheng Chung-mo was the first president of Taiwan Civil Government but split with Roger Lin in a dispute over finances of the organization. John Hsieh, chairman of the Taiwan Civil Rights Litigation Organization, was a staunch ally of TCG when ROC prosecutors investigated Lin for treason. Hsieh has since broken with Lin and recently called the group a “joke” in a letter to a Taipei newspaper. Neico Tsai, once vice-president of TCG, split with Lin and formed his own organization called Taiwan Government USA.
The common theme of TCG and its former allies is the responsibility of the United States to guarantee self-determination for Taiwan under the San Francisco Peace Treaty that ended World War II and left Taiwan in limbo. One of the group's first actions was filing a lawsuit in the District of Columbia seeking United States passports for Taiwanese. The case stalled when the court decided the decision fell to the executive branch as a political question. A federal appellate court that examined the matter was sympathetic to the TCG lawsuit and urged President Obama to act to end Taiwan's “political purgatory.”
The China Post's question about the United States and TCG may soon be answered in Washington. Roger Lin is back in court suing both the United States and the Republic of China over illegal passage of post-war Nationality Decrees that stripped Formosans of their Japanese citizenship. As the two governments defend themselves, TCG's attorneys are pushing for a declaration there is a legal responsibility for self-determination owed to the Taiwanese people.
Roger Lin may be the opportunist his critics claim, however the legal scholar has proven to be a shrewd strategist seeking a non-violent revolution. When the United States imposed Kuomintang troops on Taiwan in October 1945, the island was under United States Military Government. Lin, with his defacto government and use of US courts, is clearly following a a USMG civil affairs approach to nation-building. Although persistent rumors that TCG is a shadow government funded by the Central Intelligence Agency may not be true, if the strategic ambiguity wears thin in the face of PRC aggression toward Taiwan, the American-friendly posture of TCG will be attractive to Washington policy makers.
