Home is in the military-administered Wuqiu Township, where democracy is missing a piece
This happens every day. Chinese Communist Party fishing boats need no polite application to the military; whether they come or not is their own freedom. The military can only blow a whistle to assert sovereignty; only the Taiwanese, who hold sovereignty over Taiwan, are driven away and refused by the military.
It has been twenty years since martial law was lifted. However inadequate Taiwan's democracy may be in substance, there is no doubt about its democratic form. Yet while these democratic pioneers, or brave Taiwanese, sing praises and review the lifting of martial law, everyone has overlooked that Taiwan still has a missing corner of democracy, a blind spot after the lifting of martial law - Wuqiu. Twenty years on, it still exists within a military control system. Any Taiwanese person entering or leaving this place still requires military approval - letting you out, letting you go - as if it were a gift granted by the government to the people. As long as military control of Wuqiu exists for even one more day, Taiwan is not truly democratic, nor has martial law truly been lifted.
But does the military really regard the Fortress and Bastion Law as something sacred? Not at all!
In 1998, during the Taiwan Power Company nuclear waste exploration incident, with the military's help the team drove straight to Wuqiu. For Taipower's food, clothing, housing, transportation, and photography and videography, the Marines and the Ministry of National Defense gave the greatest possible assistance. Yet I am very grateful to Taipower. Had Taipower's nuclear waste not come knocking at Wuqiu's door that year, I would never have thought that my hometown could be known to fellow citizens, nor would it have stirred my potential to help my hometown gain some improvements.
In 2002, because I shouted at the National Social Welfare Conference: "Mr. President, please save Wuqiu!", under media attention the military verbally loosened restrictions: as long as media and Taiwanese friends applied through the township office, they could all come to Wuqiu. In other words, the Fortress and Bastion Zone Law would not use a trivial pretext as authority to nibble away at Wuqiu's opportunities to contact the outside world, much less harm the human rights of Wuqiu's people.
How time flies. In recent years the Ministry of National Defense has imperceptibly restored its hegemony: outsiders cannot go to Wuqiu, media cannot go to Wuqiu, Wuqiu cannot be photographed or filmed, Wuqiu cannot be exposed in the media, and military power directly intervenes in elections, with a crude and rough-handedness never seen before, especially most pronounced before the commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the lifting of martial law.
In 2006, mainland Chinese spouses were everywhere in Kinmen County, yet Wuqiu's mainland Chinese spouses were not allowed to go to Wuqiu. Mainland Chinese spouses of Wuqiu Township, Kinmen County, could not land on the island to meet their parents-in-law. Is that reasonable? Only later, after I asked human rights groups for assistance and the parties concerned sought help from legislators, was a marriage and family visitation channel granted.
In the most recent township representative election, many fellow villagers were on their way to Taichung Port to board a boat when they suddenly received a notice from the military saying the waves were too rough and the boat would not sail. Even the candidates were stranded in Taiwan and could not return. In fact, everyone knew the military faction had intervened, because that day's wind and waves had not reached the standard for canceling sailings; they were deeply afraid that those returning would affect the military's tacit pocket list.
The township chief by-election was even more outrageous. The military had early on said it would not provide transportation, so those who wanted to vote had already taken leave and gone home early. Yet the military uncharacteristically notified people of an extra sailing just hours before departure (normally notice is given twenty-four hours in advance), and that day instantaneous gusts reached level 9 to 10. The elderly said that in decades Wuqiu had never sailed under such gusts (at level 7 to 8 they would not sail), and never with such lightning speed. That day I was on the island and saw how perilous the docking was; the cable snapped and the boat drifted for a while. I watched with great sadness and worry. What if a soldier were injured? Why does the military unfairly manipulate elections? Why not give the people of Wuqiu a chance to learn fair competition?