Without land, where is justice? Farmers publish an ad to make their collective voice heard

Reported by / Jiang Hui-xian

Today (12/29), Apple Daily published a half-page advertisement with the appeal "Fake amendment, truly outrageous," "Without land, where is justice?" This move is the farmers' concrete protest after the Legislative Yuan passed the amendment to the Land Expropriation Act on 12/13.

The advertisement was funded voluntarily by farming friends from all over Taiwan who have suffered from land expropriation, published as a collective appearance to demonstrate their determination and demands in protesting land expropriation (full text published below).

Taiwan Rural Front spokespersons Cai Pei-hui and Chen Ping-xuan, in an interview with Newsmarket, stated that there were three reasons for publishing the advertisement:

First, democratic accountability
The amendment to the Land Expropriation Act was passed under highly controversial, black-box conditions, and the people firmly oppose it. In a democratic country, accountable politics must be upheld. This amendment completely violates procedure, and to implement democracy, we must reclaim the source of accountable politics. The legislators who passed the Executive Yuan version of the act were elected by the people, and they must take responsibility. Therefore we are publishing the list of legislators "not recommended by farmers," calling on everyone to use their votes to reject them and demand they bear political responsibility.

Second, diverse channels of communication
We are accustomed to using the internet to obtain information, but many farmers, office workers, or non-urban populations do not rely on the internet and instead use newspapers as their main source of information. Therefore we placed an advertisement in the newspaper, hoping to let more people understand the farmers' demands.

Third, farmers appearing directly
In the past, farmers' protests against land expropriation and demands to preserve prime farmland were mostly conveyed to reporters for disclosure through groups such as the Taiwan Rural Front. This time, the grandparents wanted to speak directly from their hearts and decided to appear collectively through publishing an advertisement. The cost of this advertisement came entirely from voluntary donations by farmers and groups across Taiwan facing the suffering of land expropriation. After multiple discussions, including the chair of the Dapu Self-Rescue Association and others who were very insistent, the farmers decided with a high degree of consensus to publish the advertisement, letting farmers speak directly.

At the same time, today (12/29) at 2 PM, groups including the Taiwan Rural Front, the Land Justice Grand Alliance, and the Alliance for the Defense of Rural Villages held a press conference, with the main demands being:

On December 13, the Legislative Yuan forcibly passed the highly controversial draft amendment to the Land Expropriation Act. In the same session, it also passed the draft amendment to the Real Estate Brokerage Management Act, the draft amendment to the Land Administration Agent Act, the draft amendment to the Equalization of Land Rights Act, the Housing Act, and others, collectively called the "Five Land Laws." After passage, some legislators in the chamber shouted that President Ma's "land justice" and "housing justice" had been realized. But in reality, these bills not only cannot achieve "land justice" and "housing justice," they even run completely counter to these slogans. For example, regarding the expropriation system: "the public interest and necessity assessment reports for expropriation lack an effective review mechanism, there is virtually no substantive public participation procedure, expropriation compensation is still decided by local governments, and even when market-price expropriation will begin is to be set by the Executive Yuan on a separate date."

Such an amendment has no justice whatsoever. Therefore, groups including the Taiwan Rural Front, the Alliance for the Defense of Rural Villages, the Social Housing Advocacy Consortium, the Taiwan Urban Renewal Victims Alliance, and the Wild at Heart Legal Defense Association held a joint press conference at 2 PM today at the Legislative Yuan's Zhongxing Building, titled "The amendment is all fake, justice has completely bounced," calling on all sectors to care together!

Rural Front spokesperson Cai Pei-hui stated that today's press conference and the advertisement action symbolize the formal alliance of land expropriation protest groups across Taiwan, demonstrating determination both at the movement level and in subsequent actions to push for another amendment of the land expropriation law; at the same time, the Rural Front will insist on continuing to go into villages, taking the local route, proactively going to various places to hold explanations and forums, so that more people recognize the importance of land justice, protecting prime farmland, and food security.

Below is the full text of the "Without land, where is justice?" advertisement.

[Fake amendment, truly outrageous]

Respectfully submitted by the Alliance for the Defense of Rural Villages, Taiwan Rural Front, and Land Justice Grand Alliance

Dear friends:

We are a group of farmers who have spent our whole lives cultivating the land and its crops. We are the farmers who protested the unfair land expropriation amendment on Ketagalan Boulevard on December 12, and the farmers who waited in the cold wind in front of the Legislative Yuan on December 13 for the honorable legislators to hear our voices. Together we spent the money from 12,500 jin of rice to publish this advertisement, and we thank Apple Daily for kindly giving us a discount and standing with us, so that everyone can hear our voices.

We have farmed our whole lives, raising our children to adulthood. Although farming is hard, our hearts are joyful and grounded, and we thank everyone for supporting the use of Taiwan's agricultural products to raise your children. Recently, there has been a truly outrageous pile of development projects coming to rob farmland, speculate on land, and build those so-called white-elephant parks. We thank everyone for fighting alongside us, which won us the chance for an amendment.

However, the amendment in early December this time was utterly "slipshod." Originally it was said that specific agricultural zones would be protected, that expropriation would require necessity and public interest, and that there would be hearings protecting public participation, but the government broke all its promises. Even the market-price expropriation the government spoke of changed at the last moment, with the price and implementation date far off in the indefinite future. This kind of amendment is truly vile, saying one thing and doing another to deceive the public, completely disregarding the future of agriculture and the rights and interests of the people.

We want to remind everyone that in fact expropriation does not only happen in rural areas; urban areas are also constantly experiencing it. Based on the idea of accountable politics and the courage to bear responsibility, we decided to publish the list of legislators involved in this amendment. Please open your eyes wide and see clearly who, like bullies, passed the official version of this evil land expropriation law that encloses and seizes land. As long as we have a breath left, we will persist to the end and fight for a just land expropriation act! We earnestly ask everyone, do not let these people enter the Legislative Yuan again, and together leave a bite of sweetness for our children and grandchildren!

List of legislators who opposed the civil-society version of the amendment (farmers' non-recommended list):

Ding Shou-zhong, Kong Wen-ji, Jiang Ling-jun, Jiang Yi-xiong, Wu Qing-chi, Li Ming-xing, Li Fu-xing, Lin Yu-fang, Lin Yi-shih, Lin Cang-min, Lin De-fu, Lin Hong-chih, Hou Cai-feng, Shuai Hua-min, Hung Hsiu-chu, Ji Guo-dong, Xu Shao-ping, Cao Er-zhong, Guo Su-chun, Chen Jie, Chen Shu-hui, Fei Hung-tai, Yang Ren-fu, Liao Guo-dong, Liao Wan-ru, Zhao Li-yun, Liu Sheng-liang, Pan Wei-gang, Cai Zheng-yuan, Chiang Nai-hsin, Zheng Ru-fen, Zheng Jin-ling, Lu Jia-chen, Lai Shih-bao, Jian Dong-ming, Luo Ming-cai, Luo Shu-lei

List of legislators who supported the civil-society version of the amendment:

Wang Xing-nan, Tian Qiu-jin, Yu Zheng-dao, Lin Dai-hua, Lin Shu-fen, Qiu Yi-ying, Ke Jian-ming, Tu Xing-zhe, Gao Zhi-peng, Xu Tian-cai, Guo Wen-cheng, Chen Ming-wen, Chen Jie-ru, Chen Ying, Peng Shao-jin, Huang Ren-shu, Huang Wei-zhe, Huang Shu-ying, Ye Yi-jin, Guan Bi-ling, Liu Jian-guo, Cai Tong-rong, Cai Huang-lang, Lai Kun-cheng, Xue Ling

List of legislators who did not attend:

Wang Ting-sheng, Wang Jin-pyng, Wang Jin-shi, Zhu Feng-zhi, Yu Tian, Wu Yu-sheng, Lu Xue-zhang, Li Jun-yi, Li Qing-hua, Li Hong-jun, Zhou Shou-xun, Lin Ming-qin, Lin Jian-rong, Lin Bing-kun, Qiu Yi, Sun Da-qian, Xu Yao-chang, Weng Jin-zhu, Weng Chong-jun, Ma Wen-jun, Gao Jin Su-mei, Kang Shi-ru, Zhang Jia-jun, Zhang Qing-zhong, Zhang Xian-yao, Xu Shu-bo, Guo Rong-zong, Chen Ting-fei, Chen Gen-de, Chen Fu-hai, Huang Zhi-xiong, Huang Zhao-shun, Huang Yi-jiao, Yang Qiong-ying, Yang Li-huan, Liu Quan-zhong, Pan Meng-an, Cai Jin-long, Jiang Xiao-yan, Zheng Li-wen, Lu Xiu-yan, Xiao Jing-tian, Xie Guo-liang, Zhong Shao-he, Yan Qing-biao, Su Zhen-qing
(The above list is arranged by stroke count of names)

Further reading
Defending land justice: Rural Front goes into villages, launches local actions
A few words on the action of intervening in the land expropriation amendment, and on state violence
Lawyer Zhan Shun-gui: The Ma government's housing justice is a lie! Lie! Lie!
In pursuit of fairness and justice, the people must still work hard: after the passage of the land expropriation amendment

For more information (lazy person's pack, super comparison of official and civil-society amendments) please refer to the Taiwan Rural Front website: http://www.taiwanruralfront.org/

12/29 The advertisement funded by farming friends themselves, expressing the demands for land justice and against excessive expropriation. (Layout design / Zheng An-qi)

Farming friends outside the Legislative Yuan on 1213 spontaneously initiated donations to buy a full-page advertisement, protesting the legislators who passed the Executive Yuan version of the land expropriation amendment.