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The Taoyuan Aerotropolis Tragedy 01"On the eve of the announced land expropriation, an elderly farmer reportedly took poison in suicide! Human rights groups criticize: forced expropriation violates the Constitution and harms human rights

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The Taoyuan Aerotropolis Tragedy 01"On the eve of the announced land expropriation, an elderly farmer reportedly took poison in suicide! Human rights groups criticize: forced expropriation violates the Constitution and harms human rights

With 16,000 households facing demolition, the largest expropriation case in history, the Taoyuan Aerotropolis development project begins today (November 9) with the public announcement of an expropriation area of 3,151 hectares; from the date of the announcement, transfers are prohibited, and the project enters the stage of substantive expropriation and development. Yet at the November 2 meeting on zone expropriation, news broke of an elderly farmer who had drunk pesticide in suicide.

Tsai Ching-yun, chief of Luchu Village, reported directly to Taoyuan Mayor Cheng Wen-tsan at the meeting that an elderly farmer in the village, Hsu Shih-ting, could not bear the expropriation of his ancestral farmland, fell into unrelieved depression, and took poison in suicide. Unexpectedly, after hearing this, Cheng Wen-tsan did not respond directly and immediately returned to the agenda, leaving those present deeply chilled.

As the announced expropriation approached, the more than one jia of farmland under Hsu Shih-ting's name came to nearly 3,000 ping; calculated at the land expropriation price, the compensation would reach over 100 million yuan, an astonishing figure. At market acquisition prices, the amount would be even more staggering. Yet the elderly farmer was not only unwilling to stand by and watch his farmland be expropriated, but chose to die to make his stance clear.

Many expropriated households live under the systemic oppression of zone expropriation. Along with old farmer Hsu's family, NewsMarket reporters visited five expropriated households to understand their pain and helplessness on the ground, which absolutely cannot be lightly dismissed with the city government's phrase "handled as individual cases."

Why seek death? Old farmer's son: The farmland was my father's stage for a lifetime; no amount of money can replace it

The time goes back to July 31, when 80-year-old farmer Hsu Shih-ting was found by his family collapsed in the farm shed on his own farmland in Luchu Village. His son, Hsu Ming-chuan, said, "That morning, he still went to work in the fields. After lunch at noon, he should normally have been at home taking a nap, but his shoes were nowhere to be seen. Who works in the fields in the dead of noon?" Feeling vaguely uneasy, he went to the fields to look for him and found his father collapsed in the farm shed in the field, with a can of remaining paraquat beside him.

Hsu Ming-chuan, son of elderly farmer Hsu Shih-ting, said this farmland was his father's stage for a lifetime, and in the end he chose to drink pesticide in his ancestral farmland to take his own life. (Photo / Lin Chi-yang)

"The farmland was my father's stage for a lifetime. Without this stage, it seems life also lost its meaning." Hsu Ming-chuan, who often worked in the fields with his father, said, "What my father was proudest of in his life was farming. When other people's fields were taken to put up sheet-metal factories, he firmly refused. He worked from sunrise to sunset every day. For a farmer of more than sixty years, his proudest moment was seeing the fields lush and green; growing rice and vegetables was not enough for the family to eat, and he could still give them to relatives and friends."

Some questioned whether Hsu Shih-ting was weary of life after long illness or under psychological pressure, and Hsu Ming-chuan firmly denied it. "My father was strong and healthy. At 80, he still did the weeding, seedling raising, ditching and field ridges all by himself, never leaving it to others. There were no financial problems at home either. The brothers got along harmoniously, and there is currently no debt. It was absolutely not a financial problem."

"During these ten years of the Aerotropolis, land brokers came to persuade him endlessly, but my father would not sell, and that was that." Hsu Ming-chuan said that although his father did not say it aloud, the whole family knew he was tormented inside. "After all, it was ancestral farmland. He had a sense of mission to pass it on. To lose the land in his hands, no amount of money could make up for it. Under his example, we brothers each developed in our own ways, but the family never once discussed selling the land."

Even though the family felt both reluctance and shock, Hsu Ming-chuan believed they did not blame his father harshly. "What the old man chose may have been his way of saying goodbye to the stage of his life," which made them feel even more strongly their father's intense farmer character.

TAHR: The right to housing is a basic human right; forced expropriation harms the elderly farmer's emotions and dignity

"The right to housing is a basic human right guaranteed by international human rights covenants, ensuring that a safe and dignified life is not disturbed. The harm to human rights from land expropriation begins as soon as life is disrupted," said Yu I-chia, a housing rights specialist at the Taiwan Association for Human Rights, stating plainly the definition of the "right to housing."

Facing yet another elderly farmer's suicide because of Aerotropolis expropriation, she said seriously, "The right to housing has a spatial dimension, and this is even more so for farmers. The elderly farmer devoted his life's effort to cultivating ancestral land; the emotional connection to this land and its symbolic meaning for the family cannot be measured or replaced by the amount of compensation money." From the perspective of the right to housing, when farmland is forcibly expropriated from an elderly farmer, harm has already been done to his dignity and stable life.

Yu I-chia, a specialist at the Taiwan Association for Human Rights, believes the right to housing has a spatial dimension, and the relationship between the elderly farmer and the farmland also falls under the right to housing. (Provided by the Environmental Rights Foundation)

Still resisting even in the final stage of cancer, founder of the Aerotropolis Anti-Forced Eviction Alliance Tsai Mei-ling: "How can the government do this to the people?"

"I really don't know what to say." Having devoted eight years to the struggle, Tsai Mei-ling, founder of the Aerotropolis Anti-Forced Eviction Alliance, was speechless for a moment when she heard another elderly farmer had committed suicide, reminding her of the elderly farmer Lu A-yun, who killed himself in 2013.

"I hope the media will not just consume the death of the elderly farmer, but can see where the problem of zone expropriation lies." She cautioned the visiting reporters, yet also revealed that as an organizer she felt guilt in her heart. "For a long time I was busy with the struggle, but forgot that expropriated households, besides defending their homes, need psychological companionship even more."

For Tsai Mei-ling, from the moment the development project was announced, expropriated households were plunged into a bleak life, forced to face a life full of uncertainty. Those who agreed had to endure harassment from government personnel and real estate brokers, while those who opposed it had to bear the torment of a long series of struggles and withstand the prejudiced gaze of outsiders, being labeled "greedy, insatiably greedy." "The torment borne inside is far beyond what outsiders can understand."

"With the help of the Taiwan Association for Human Rights, it was only in 2014 that I first entered a review meeting of the Construction and Planning Agency. Only then did I know that we could say no, that we did not have to feel self-pity. From that moment I knew I had to stand up, and only then could things turn around." With the assistance of human rights and social movement groups, after years of struggle, Tsai Mei-ling's home was successfully excluded from the expropriation area, but she still continues to take part in the entire anti-forced-eviction struggle.

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