1/25/2016 5:33:00 PM
HEADLINES
PERSPECTIVE: Taiwan Elects ‘Independence’ President; Relations With China Again an Issue
Relations between Taiwan and China are again an issue with the election of a president from the independence party of Taiwan.
Earlier this month Taiwan elected Tsai Ing-wen as the first woman president, and, in addition to the presidency, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won parliamentary majorities.
Taiwan manufactures 14% of the world’s fasteners by output value and 17% of production volume, according to Taiwan’s Metal Industries Research & Development Centre.
Tsai’s election led the Chinese state-run media to announce that Taiwan should abandon its “hallucinations” about claiming independence from China.
With 3.7 million square miles, China has hundreds of missiles pointed across the 110-mile Taiwan Strait at the 35,980 sq mile island it claims.
Two Taiwan fastener manufacturers told FIN they do not expect the election will change their country’s fastener industry.
“From our point of view, we do not think the election results will have impact on fastener exports,” Keiun Liu of Ying Ming Industry Co. Ltd. suggested. Taiwan fastener manufacturers export to many countries and few rely on sales to China, Liu pointed out.
“I do not expect any major changes for fastener manufacturing export due to the
election results,” Jimmy Ko of Tong Hwei Enterprise Co. Ltd. He is pleased with the election results and expects the Taiwan fastener industry will continue to grow.
Founded in 1969, Ying Ming manufactures hex head and socket head screws for automotive and other industries.
“We are happy with the election results and expect a new era coming,” Liu said. “We are not afraid of China.”
Founded in 1978, Tong Hwei has manufactures stainless steel fasteners. THE exports to North America and Asia is its second largest area, followed by South America. “It seems the news about the recent election in Taiwan have drawn everyone’s attention,” Ko said.
Taiwan today is based on the Nationalists fleeing mainland China in 1949 after the civil war with Mao Zedong’s Communists. Taiwan was a Japanese colony from 1895 to 1945.
Among possible responses by China include further reducing Taipei’s ability to win diplomatic allies and participate in international organizations.
In a statement issued after Tsai’s win, the Taiwan Affairs Office – China’s body for handling Taiwan affairs – reaffirmed its opposition to Taiwan independence, but said it would work to maintain peace and stability.
“Our will is as strong as a rock, our attitude unswerving on the principal matter of safeguarding national sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the Taiwan Affairs Office said.
“We share with the Taiwan people a profound interest in the continuation of cross-Strait peace and stability,” U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said in a post-election statement. The U.S. is an ally and supplies weapons to Taiwan.
Tsai pledged peace between Taiwan – an island nation with 23.4 million people – and China with a population of 1.3 billion.
Tsai won 56% against Eric Chu of the China-friendly Nationalist Party, which has ruled Taiwan under incumbent president Ma Ying-jeou since 2008.
The DPP won 68 seats in the 113-seat legislature, giving her administration policy-making strength over the next four years and more leverage over Beijing on cross-strait deals.
China’s government-controlled Xinhua News Agency noted Tsai’s pledges for peace and to maintain the “status quo” with China, Reuters.com reported.
Xinhua also warned any moves towards independence were like a “poison” that would cause Taiwan to perish.
“If there is no peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait, Taiwan’s new authority will find the sufferings of the people it wishes to resolve on the economy, livelihood and its youth will be as useless as looking for fish in a tree,” according to Xinhua.
Under the headline, “Taiwan Election Results Likely to Complicate Relations With China,” the Wall Street Journal announced that “the drubbing Taiwan’s ruling party took in local elections looks set to complicate the island’s economically robust but politically fraught relations with China in the coming years.”
The Global Times, a tabloid published by the Communist Party’s official People’s Daily newspaper, said in an editorial that if Tsai’s administration sought to “cross the red line” like Chen, Taiwan would “meet a dead end.”
China Times, a China-friendly Taiwan newspaper, called on Tsai to be a “dove for cross strait peace.”
“Peace across the Taiwan Strait is the most important external factor for Taiwan’s stable development,” China Times editorialized.
China’s Foreign Ministry reacted to the vote by stating that “There is only one China in the world, the mainland and Taiwan both belong to one China and China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity will not brook being broken up.”
China is expected to wait to see if Tsai makes any concessions, especially in the run-up to her inauguration on May 20, according to experts. If not forthcoming, they said, Beijing could inflict economic pain by, for example, restricting the millions of Chinese tourists who visit Taiwan each year.
One signal Beijing is watching is if Tsai agrees with a mutually acceptable formula on relations. Thus far Tsai has not backed the consensus devised by officials from Beijing and the KMT government in 1992, that “holds that both sides agree that there is only one China, without defining what that meant in practical terms.”
At the victory celebration, the 59-year old former law professor repeated a campaign pledge to maintain the status quo and avoid surprises in relations with the mainland, but then defended Taiwan’s democracy in contrast to the one-party rule of China.
“Our democratic system, national identity and international space must be fully respected,” Tsai told a news conference. “Any suppression [of those] will harm the stability of relations” between China and Taiwan, she said.
Tsai has proposed to open 200,000 units of affordable housing in eight years. Her party suggested in May that Taiwan’s laws change to raise wages and cut work weeks from 84 per two weeks to 40 in one.
Tsai also reaffirmed Taiwan’s sovereignty claim over East China Sea islands also claimed by China but controlled by Japan. She said Taiwan would also work to lower tensions in the South China Sea, where Taiwan, China and four other governments share overlapping territorial claims.
The Huffington Post noted that Tsai has “refused to endorse the principle that Taiwan and China are parts of a single nation to be unified eventually. Beijing has made that its baseline for continuing negotiations that have produced a series of pacts on trade, transport and exchanges. Observers say China is likely to adopt a wait-and-see approach, but might use diplomatic and economic pressure if Tsai is seen as straying too far from its unification agenda.”
For more on the story of the Taiwan fastener industry click on the Fastener History section of GlobalFastenerNews.com:
2010 FIN – Taiwan Invites the World to Visit the Source
Ho Hong, Chun Yu, Samshing Fastech, Jau Yeou, Boltun, Jinn Her and Tong Hwei are hosts for tour promoting first Taiwan International Fastener Show.
1988 FIN – Taiwan Encouraging Investment in the U.S.
Taiwan is now the major source of imported fasteners in the U.S.
1990 FIN – A Talk With TIFI Chairman Henry Pan
Taiwan’s largest fastener manufacturers are Tung Kuang, Chun Yu, San Shing, Tong Hwae and Bao Wan.
1993 FIN – Commerce Department Issues Dumping Charge Against Taiwan Lock Washers
Process involved both Bush & Clinton administrations.
1994 FIN – Four Summer Typhoons Cut Taiwan Fastener Export
Damages to platers, heat treaters and carton manufacturer slow fastener shipments.
1995 FIN – Taiwan Screw Exports Rising With U.S. Orders
Screw shipments to the U.S. during the first seven months of 1994-the period ending just before the typhoons, which disrupted fastener, production-were up 23%.
2002 FIN – China Rapidly Approaching Taiwan’s Fastener Exports
Touring Tong Ming, Gem Year, Shanghai Ben Yuan and Linkwell.
2006 FIN – NFDA Panelists: No Question About Globalization
Roseman, Grabner, Schwind, Cohn and Hebert offer observations.
2012 FIN – The Changing Face of Taiwan’s Fastener History
FIN interviews Taiwan manufacturing leaders Chu Chien Tsai, Sherman Hong, Davis Leu and Gordon Lin.
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