Xizhou must not repeat the Wang family tragedy; all citizens should oversee public power

Photo: the excavator driving piles across from the township office on the 28th.

On March 28, as hundreds of young students gathered at the Wang family home in Shilin to resist the city government's violent forced demolition, farmers in Xizhou Township were also blocking the excavators of the Central Taiwan Science Park Phase 4 water diversion project.

Ever since February 25, when members of the Anti-CTSP Water Grab Self-Rescue Association discovered that construction had begun, the farmers had not only traveled north several times to protest and hold press conferences, but had also gone to the construction site every day to monitor the work. Unexpectedly, this water diversion projectthat had already received a promise from National Science Council Minister Zhu Jingyi to temporarily halt work has never actually stopped, devouring the land inch by inch, day after day.

On March 21, National Science Council Deputy Minister He Chen-hong and 8 legislators visited Xizhou for an on-site inspection, and He Chen-hong promised in front of the residents that the CTSP water diversion project would be temporarily halted.

Can public authority also be outsourced?

On March 27, Hsu Shih-jung, a professor in the Department of Land Economics at National Chengchi University, made a particularly incisive statement on the PTS program "Have Something to Say." He said that although the Land Expropriation Act is bad law, expropriation can only be initiated by the public sector, whereas urban renewal directly transfers the right to expropriate people's homes and land to the private sector, that is, to developers, for implementation. The government not only has no mechanism at all to supervise developers, but also uses public authority to enforce forced demolitions on behalf of the private sector. How absurd is that!

Shift the scene away from the Wang family home in Shilin, and how is the water grab incident of CTSP Phase 4 playing out at the Cizipizhen Canal in southern Changhua any different? The CTSP Administration Commission entrusted the project to the Changhua Farmland Irrigation Association for implementation. Not a public agency, but merely a "civic association organization," the irrigation association was nevertheless able to carry out a project worth nearly 2.2 billion, and it also holds the authority to allocate agricultural water, can sell water to CTSP, and controls the earth and rock excavated during construction, as well as the large amount of sand and gravel that will settle in the sedimentation pond once turbid water is diverted in the future.

When the new minister of the National Science Council took office, intending to face the reality that central Taiwan lacks water and is unsuitable for high-water-consumption optoelectronics industries, and to review and adjust the direction of industry, they were nevertheless powerless to stop this completely unnecessary water grab project.

On the morning of the 28th, Wu Yin-ning, secretary-general of Xizhou Township Office, who had originally planned to go to Taipei to visit the National Science Council minister, received a message from residents as soon as she got on the high-speed rail: construction machinery had brazenly arrived across from the township office and begun work. At Taipei Station she urgently called National Science Council Deputy Minister He Chen-hong, who had visited Xizhou for an on-site inspection on March 21. He Chen-hong told her by phone that senior National Science Council officials had already personally called Changhua Irrigation Association chairman Lu Lu-shan several times, asking him to tell the contractor to temporarily stop work, but the Changhua Irrigation Association, feeling secure, allowed the contractor to continue digging. As for the official document sent by the National Science Council requesting that the project be halted, because it required approval by the Executive Yuan, it was still lying at the Executive Yuan and had never left the door.

(Left) Hsieh Bao-yuan, chairman of the Anti-CTSP Water Grab Self-Rescue Association, explaining the situation to legislators including Zhang Xiaofeng.
(Right) On March 28, Xizhou residents blocking the excavator working across from the township office.

Wrong policy Who loses? Who pays?

Wu Yin-ning and members of the self-rescue association had only just arrived in Taipei when they immediately decided to cancel the visit and return directly to Xizhou to join the residents in protest. But at the construction site across from the township office, a middle-aged man who claimed to be a representative of Weimeng Engineering, apparently having drunk quite a lot, berated the residents who had come to show concern in a rambling and incoherent way. First he said, "You haven't received an official document, so what gives you the right to tell us to stop work?" Then he said, "Your protest is useless. Stopping work for one day costs tens of thousands!"

In the end, after protests by nearly 30 residents, and after three hours, the subcontractor finally called a truck to move away the construction materials and machinery. While waiting for the truck, the subcontractor kept explaining to the residents, "We thought there were relatively few homes alongside this stretch of road, so we came to do this section first. We didn't know the township office was right across the street." He also repeatedly said they had been wronged, that listening to the National Science Council was wrong and listening to Weimeng was also wrong, and that the loss of tens of thousands for each day of stoppage could only be absorbed by themselves. But the residents also said indignantly that it was the National Science Council's official document that had been so slow in coming, not that they loved protesting, and that they did not want to cause losses for the contractor either.

In fact, although the farmers of Xizhou drove away the excavators, the project had long since been dug into Erlin Township and Pitou Township, and on the day this article was published, excavation also continued within Xizhou. Where no one protested, the contractor kept digging.

Compared with the resolve of the Taipei City Government in forcibly demolishing the Wang family home, and then looking again at a single work-stoppage document that still had not reached the Changhua Irrigation Association from the National Science Council to the Executive Yuan, what a long journey it was. So the government's administrative efficiency can indeed be fast or slow at will. And the Changhua Irrigation Association, a private body completely free of government oversight, repeatedly issued statements to the media, threatening residents who came out to protest with the claim that "stopping work for one day incurs huge penalty fees that no one can afford."

The Anti-CTSP Water Grab Self-Rescue Association called on the National Science Council, since it had already expressed its determination to review the transformation of CTSP Phase 4, to first halt the completely unnecessary Cizipizhen Canal water diversion project before the future industry type and actual water usage were determined. Otherwise, all taxpayers would once again have to pay the bill for a wrong policy!

(Left) A man who appeared to have drunk a lot and claimed to be a representative of Weimeng Engineering kept shouting at the residents who came to protest, "Your protest is useless!"
(Right) On the 28th, Xizhou residents confronted the contractor for three hours, and the subcontractor finally agreed to move the machinery away.

Full record of rushed excavation for the CTSP Phase 4 water diversion project:

On February 25, members of the Anti-CTSP Water Grab Self-Rescue Association discovered that the water diversion project near the Xizhou urban area had begun pile driving and excavation on February 23.

On March 11, legislator Lin Shu-fen questioned National Science Council Minister Zhu Jingyi in the Legislative Yuan about the water diversion project. Zhu Jingyi asked CTSP Administration Commission Director-General Yang Wen-ke to answer on his behalf, and Yang Wen-ke said the work-stoppage issue would be handled within 3 days.

On March 15, the project continued. Nearly 50 farmers from Xizhou Township went north to Ketagalan Boulevard to protest that the water diversion project sacrificed farmers and deprived them of their livelihoods.

On March 21, the Education and Culture Committee of the Legislative Yuan arranged an on-site inspection. Eight cross-party legislators including Lin Shu-fen and Zhang Xiaofeng, along with National Science Council Deputy Minister He Chen-hong, visited the water source in Dazhuang Village, Xizhou Township. In front of 500 residents who had come to express their opposition to the water grab, He Chen-hong promised that the CTSP Phase 4 water diversion project would be temporarily halted. CTSP Administration Commission Director-General Yang Wen-ke also said in front of the residents that if machinery was seen at the construction site, it was only restoring the excavated sections, not construction.

On March 22, construction continued. The contractor on site told members of the self-rescue association that because residents had protested on the 21st, they had first moved away the machinery and pile plates, but they had not received any work-stoppage document, and in order not to breach contract and be fined, they had no choice but to continue the project schedule.

On March 26, members of the Anti-Water-Grab Self-Rescue Association went north and held a press conference together with legislators Lin Shu-fen and Zhang Xiaofeng and the Taiwan Rural Front, accusing CTSP Administration Commission Director-General Yang Wen-ke of lying outright. Yang Wen-ke responded that he had already coordinated with the subcontractor to stop work first.

On March 27, construction continued.

On March 28, under strong blocking by Xizhou residents, the contractor agreed to move away the construction machinery in front of the Xizhou Township Office, but excavation continued in Erlin Township, Pitou Township, and other locations in Xizhou Township.

Mural painted by Xizhou Township residents at the source of the Cizipizhen Canal in Dazhuang Village.

• CTSP Phase 4 in major breakdown - the shattered Xiangsiliao cannot go back
• Who decides work stoppage? The National Science Council says stop, the local side keeps working
  
• Is the CTSP Phase 4 Erlin Park a farce or a tragedy
  
• Closing the net