Standing at the crossroads of justice and benevolence
On the morning of September 28, at the intersection of Gongyi Road and Ren'ai Road in Dapu, Zhunan, Miaoli, I said goodbye to a friend. This friend started from nothing, worked hard to support his family, and poured all his effort into keeping a home and protecting it. His name was Chang Sen-wen.
He was trampled by local corrupt officials, deceived by the central authorities in power, abused by the administrative system, insulted by local monsters, and abandoned by Taiwanese society. His property was seized; his life was seized.
Was there truly no chance, no key that could have saved him? Of course there was. But to say who could have saved him is really to count up who should have saved him and did not, and even who gave him a push. And this is, astonishingly, the heavy road along which Taiwanese society has exhausted all righteousness and benevolence.
The System, Turned into a Weapon of Violence
If the administrative system had functioned normally, Mr. Chang Sen-wen's home would not have been destroyed and his life would not have been lost.
All the data show that Miaoli County has a large amount of idle industrial land, and that urban plans have long been in oversupply. Yet the Dapu case was presented under the sheep's head of industrial demand while selling the dog meat of a land-speculation urban development project.
This expropriation and development, utterly lacking necessity or legitimacy, had to pass, in administrative procedure, through several levels of review in sequence: the Regional Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior, the Miaoli County Urban Planning Committee, the Urban Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior, and the Land Expropriation Review Committee of the Ministry of the Interior (now changed to the Land Expropriation Review Group).
And this development case was neither appropriate nor reasonable in terms of national land use (see Article 15-2, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 1 of the Regional Planning Act). Yet on September 10, 2003, the Regional Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior approved the application upon review; on December 25, 2006, the Miaoli County Urban Planning Committee passed it upon deliberation; on August 26, 2008, the Urban Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior resolved to approve it; and on April 14, 2009, the Land Expropriation Review Committee of the Ministry of the Interior resolved to approve it. How did a case that should never have passed make it through review after review and complete every administrative procedure? Why, why?
The system should have restrained reckless development and land expropriation. Why, when facing the Miaoli County government led by Liu Cheng-hung, did it develop gaps and throw its doors wide open, and instead become the violence faced by Chang Sen-wen and others whose land was forcibly taken?
When the civil service system becomes a toolbox for political decisions, and when expert committee members become guarantors of reckless development, then the system is violence. And those participants in the operation of these systems, who neglected their duties and their responsibilities and left the system utterly incapacitated, should they not be held accountable?
A Promise, Turned into a Stone Thrown Down a Well
Three years ago (August 17, 2010), the written conclusion reached in discussion by Wu Den-yih (then Premier of the Executive Yuan) and Jiang Yi-huah (then Minister of the Interior) inside the Executive Yuan should have been a chance at life, but unexpectedly became a fatal blow.
The so-called satisfactory solution of the evil politicians did indeed restart the administrative procedure and let this case enter the review of the Urban Planning Committee once more for modification. Therefore, the 226th meeting of the Miaoli County Urban Planning Committee (December 3, 2010) and the 746th meeting of the Urban Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior (December 28, 2010) both resolved to preserve the original site of the Chang Pharmacy property through a "special corner cut."
But the local jackals persevered relentlessly, never stopping until their goal was reached, and the Urban Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior astonishingly overturned the decision at its 755th meeting (May 10, 2011), reducing the resolution for the special corner cut and original-house preservation for the Chang Pharmacy to zero, and at the 784th meeting of the Urban Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior (July 24, 2012) confirmed the rejection of its preservation.
Three years of ravaging, three years of trampling, became the fatal blow of a stone thrown down a well. What had been the vicious property-seizing conduct of a local tyrant's despotic rule was thought to have been halted by the central government, yet in the end the central government joined the group in hunting him down.
Swindlers of Shame and Evil
Who were the ones who agreed to help him, yet drove him into a dead end?
Wu Den-yih, the man who set the trap and swindled him, lifted Mr. Chang Sen-wen high and then dropped him hard. Three years after his lies, he shifted the blame to the local government, as if it all had nothing to do with him, as if it were none of his damn business.
Jiang Yi-huah, then Minister of the Interior, concurrently served as chairman of the Urban Planning Committee (chair of the meeting). If only he had been willing to attend and chair the meeting (this was his duty), to explain the conclusion of the discussions to the committee members, and to explain the Ministry of the Interior's feasibility assessment, would this committee, nearly half of whose members were government agency representatives, have failed to pass it? Would it have overturned the decision so easily? Would the Chang Pharmacy have been unable to keep its home?
The fact is, Jiang Yi-huah never attended the meeting, never chaired it (the meeting was chaired in his place by Deputy Minister of the Interior Chien Tai-lang), and never fulfilled the promise, and he even fabricated four conditions to evade responsibility.
Wu and Jiang, lying and breaking faith, trampled over the people's homes and bodies to climb to the peak of political power. Can Taiwanese society still turn a blind eye to such shameless, evil swindlers?
Moreover, those civil servants who took part in the Executive Yuan consultations and technical assessments and confirmed that the property could be preserved through a special corner cut, those members of the Miaoli County Urban Planning Committee, and those members of the Urban Planning Committee of the Ministry of the Interior. These people gave Mr. Chang Sen-wen a push and let him fall into an abyss of despair. How can they get off scot-free and not be held accountable?
Ma's Two Human Rights Covenants
Ma Ying-jeou, the president, often boasted of ratifying the two human rights covenants (the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ICCPR, and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, ICESCR), thereby implementing the universal values of international human rights norms.
Indeed, on April 22, 2009, the president promulgated the Act to Implement the Two Covenants, which took effect on December 10. In addition, on October 10, 2010, the president announced the establishment of the Presidential Human Rights Consultative Committee.
But what matters is that Article 8 of the Act to Implement the Two Covenants states: "Government agencies at all levels shall, in accordance with the content of the two covenants, review the laws and administrative measures under their jurisdiction; where any are inconsistent with the provisions of the two covenants, they shall complete the enactment (formulation), amendment, or repeal of laws and the improvement of administrative measures within two years after this Act takes effect."
We cannot help but ask: does the Land Expropriation Act, amended in 2011 (December 13) and promulgated and implemented in 2012 (January 4), conform to the human rights covenants? If it does, why is there still the destruction of homes and loss of life in Dapu?
In addition, on June 27 of this year (2013), the Presidential Human Rights Consultative Committee held that the Executive Yuan and the Miaoli County government should abide by the norms of the two covenants protecting human rights, and therefore resolved to "ask the Ministry of the Interior to coordinate with Miaoli County to hold a hearing, and before that, the demolition of above-ground structures in Dapu, Miaoli, should be temporarily suspended" (see the July 4 NOWnews report, remarks by Wang You-ling, member of the Presidential Human Rights Consultative Committee). Why was the demolition not suspended? Why was no hearing held? Did Ma Ying-jeou ever say a single fair word about this?
How could Ma's commitment to putting the universal values of human rights into practice have led to Mr. Chang Sen-wen's home being destroyed and his life lost?
Insensate Judiciary, Giving Liu His Opportunity
Once the administrative procedure was complete, the people could only seek judicial relief.
On July 9, the four households in Dapu petitioned the court to suspend the enforcement of the forced demolition. On July 12, the Taichung High Administrative Court treated human rights as "subjective attachment," holding that the loss could be compensated with money and was not "difficult to restore damage," and therefore dismissed the preservative measure.
This ruling clearly shows that the judiciary, like the administration, is insensate to the people's homes, land, emotions, memories, and suffering, disregards the people's property rights and right to work, and thus abandons relief for the people's basic human rights. It also granted Liu Cheng-hung the fine opportunity to demolish houses on July 18, planting the root of disaster that deprived Mr. Chang Sen-wen of his right to life.
Judges, is life merely subjective attachment? How is life to be priced, how is loss to be compensated? Is death really damage that can be restored?
Jackals on All Sides, Society Abandons Him
What drove Mr. Chang Sen-wen to the end of the road were the jackals of local pork-barrel interests.
The neighborhood chief held a press conference and a neighborhood residents' meeting, local politicians held briefing sessions, and the county government bought newspaper advertisements. To plunder collectively and achieve the demolition, they stopped at almost nothing, using local development and traffic safety to slander the Chang family, and even publicly disclosed information about the Chang family's property, letting the media interrogate the Chang family bloodthirstily.
Can Taiwanese society really be so foolish as not to distinguish that the premise of expropriation is "necessity," not how much property one owns? And why has such accusation never been laid on Liu Cheng-hung, such a powerful local tyrant with houses and property? How can he still keep his home in the High Speed Rail special district?
Unfortunately, society did not save Mr. Chang Sen-wen. Some remained silent and said nothing, some made cold remarks and cold comments, and some even danced with the wolves. In the end, the cruel state tyranny and the pork-sharing wolfhounds ended Mr. Chang's life without using weapons. There was no call to stop, no powerful collective social force calling stop, stop.
Do these people know that Mr. Chang Sen-wen was not the first to die at the hands of the expropriation system, and will not be the last? Do these people understand that we are all people in the play?
All of This, Said in Hindsight
On September 28, I witnessed the absurd theater of death in Taiwanese society, at the intersection of righteousness and benevolence.
I bid farewell to the victim. And I make a small prayer.
May I ask this of all citizens of Taiwanese society. Gather all your strength, get to the bottom of this matter of seizing people's property and taking people's lives, and bid farewell to cruel tyranny, bid farewell to the tyrannical Ma, Wu, Jiang, and Liu.
I beg you all, I am willing to walk with you forever.
