Pingpu recognized under Act for Indigenous Peoples

SUPERFICIAL TITLE:Pingpu campaigners said that a new classification was not what they had fought for, and that they fear the CIP might stall on Aboriginal rights issues

By Jason Pan  /  Staff reporter

Tainan Mayor William Lai, left, takes part in Kabua-Sua Village’s Siraya Night Festival in Tainan on Tuesday, during which he said that the Pingpu Siraya are an indigenous community.

Photo courtesy of the Tainan City Government

The government yesterday approved a proposal to recognize Pingpu Aborigines as indigenous peoples, by amending the Status Act For Indigenous Peoples (原住民身分法) to restore their identity, and linguistic and cultural rights, in accordance with a policy of transitional justice advanced by President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文).

The decision to create a new community, known as Pingpu Indigenous People, was announced yesterday by the Executive Yuan following a meeting on policies and status laws regarding Pingpu communities, with deliberations by government officials, academics and representatives of Pingpu communities.

Some Pingpu leaders welcomed the news, hailing it as a “historic decision” for the government to finally recognize Pingpu communities as Taiwanese indigenous peoples, adding that it would open a new era for justice and equality for all the major ethnic and cultural groups in Taiwan.

“We are very happy that the Executive Yuan pushed forward on this policy. It is time for Pingpu communities to regain their indigenous status, which they had possessed in the past. On behalf of the Pingpu Siraya community in Tainan City, I want to thank the central government for respecting the right to self-identity and for the recognition of their indigenous status,” Tainan Mayor William Lai (賴清德) said. “This is the first time we have had a positive response from the government on this issue, after decades of struggling and campaigning.”

“However, there is more work to do to promote the cultural identities and traditions of Pingpu communities to restore and protect their rights the same as those of other recognized indigenous peoples,” he added.

Other Pingpu campaigners said that there are still protracted negotiations and hard bargaining to be done with the Council of Indigenous Peoples (CIP) in the years to come, as the proposal requires an itemized examination of the Indigenous Peoples Basic Act (原住民族基本法) on affected rights and applications of Pingpu communities, after the process of amending the Status Act For Indigenous Peoples (原住民身分法).

There has been opposition to the recognition of some Pingpu communities as indigenous peoples to limit their privileges and rights, and government subsidies given to 16 of the recognized Aboriginal groups, activists said.

Pingpu Papora youth campaigner Aidu Mali from central Taiwan said her youth organization has been deliberately excluded from meetings between the Executive Yuan and the CIP over the past year.

“The proposal to create another category as ‘Pingpu Indigenous People’ was not what we fought for. It only gives us a superficial title and we fear that the CIP will work hard to stall on granting any indigenous rights. In the end, we could be denied our rights and excluded from the system again,” she said.

Ketagalan community Pingpu rights campaigner Chen Kimman (陳金萬) said that although he welcomed the development, he also warned that CIP officials, in their own self-interest, had chosen not to grant indigenous status to Pingpu communities, but had deliberately drawn out the process with legal amendments and protracted negotiations, which could drag on for many years and could be impeded by politicians and special-interest groups.

Earliest colonizers of Vanuatu, Tonga came from Taiwan

AFP, WELLINGTON

An undated handout photograph from Australian National University shows a skeleton in Vanuatu’s oldest cemetery outside the capital, Port Vila.

Photo: AFP / Australian National University

Ancient DNA has revealed the first inhabitants of Vanuatu and Tonga came from Asia, not other Oceanic populations as has long been assumed, a study published yesterday found.

The study sheds light on the last great human migration into unpopulated lands, when a people called the Lapita fanned out into the South Pacific about 3,000 years ago.

Little is known of the mysterious culture beyond their distinctive dotted pottery and the human remains they left behind.

Scientists had speculated that they were an offshoot of Australo-Papuan populations of Australia, New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, who arrived in the region 40,000 to 50,000 years ago.

However, analysis of three skeletons from Vanuatu’s oldest cemetery found they came from Asia, with no trace of DNA from their Pacific neighbors.

“Their original base population is Asian. They were straight out of Taiwan and perhaps the northern Philippines,” said Matthew Spriggs, a professor at the Australian National University and one of the researchers involved in the study.

“They traveled past places where people were already living, but when they got to Vanuatu there was nobody there. These are the first people,” he said.

Spriggs said another DNA sample from a Lapita skeleton in Tonga returned similar results.

“We know this because testing conducted by two different laboratories in the United States and Germany confirm that the samples are of the same people,” he said.

He added that it now appeared the Asiatic Lapita first colonized the South Pacific, then intermingled with a second wave of Australo-Papuan settlers to create the region’s modern genetic mix.

Ron Pinhasi, a professor at University College Dublin, said the study, published in Nature, was made possible by improved methods of extracting material from skeletal remains.

“The unexpected results about Oceanian history highlight the power of ancient DNA to overthrow established models of the human past,” he said.

Passage of spouse naturalization reforms urged

By Abraham Gerber  /  Staff reporter

Controversy over the naturalization of Chinese spouses should not hold up progress on legal amendments covering other foreign spouses, reform advocates said yesterday as they questioned the resolve of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to push for changes after party lawmakers boycotted cross-caucus negotiations.

The Taiwan TransAsia Sisters Association, Labor Rights Association, Taipei Women’s Rescue Foundation and other groups held a news conference at the Legislative Yuan, during which they shouted slogans critical of the DPP and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for politicking over proposed amendments to the Nationality Act (國籍法) and the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (兩岸人民關係條例).

After DPP members of the legislature’s Internal Administration Committee proposed amendments to the Nationality Act to ease the naturalization process for foreign spouses, their KMT counterparts proposed reducing the number of years it takes for Chinese spouses to become naturalized Republic of China (ROC) citizens, which the committee’s KMT co-convener attempted to push through the committee in a surprise evening session.

In the wake of the controversy over the KMT’s action, both amendments have languished in “cross-caucus negotiations,” the advocates said yesterday, adding that the DPP boycotted a second round of talks last week.

National Chengchi University law professor Bruce Liao (廖元豪) said he was worried that the DPP’s actions show that it does not intend to pass the legislation, given that the KMT minority on the committee is unable to force a “coupling” or block passage of the proposals.

“The two sets of amendments do not have to be tied — they could be decoupled and move forward at different rates,” Liao said.

“What we are concerned about is that they [the DPP] do not care whether any legislation passes,” he said.

“Because the DPP is the majority, it can push legislation through, but it appears to be willing to take advantage of this opportunity to make a political point,” he said.

Liao also criticized KMT legislators for now promoting a reduction in residency requirements, which the KMT had not been willing to pass in the years that it held the legislative majority.

“The advantage the KMT gets from this controversy is that it can accuse the DPP of hypocrisy in its concern for human rights, but why did it not pass this when it was in the majority?” he said.

Labor Rights Association executive director Wang Chuan-ping (王娟萍) said that there are disadvantageous provisions in both parties’ amendments, citing a proposal to require Chinese spouses provide financial statements and take a civics test.

Taiwan TransAsia Sisters Association executive secretary Hung Man-chi (洪滿枝) criticized one proposed provision that would indefinitely extend the length of time during which a foreign spouse’s ROC citizenship could be revoked.

“Spouses already undergo extensive review before they are granted national ID cards,” Hung said.

A lack of limits on official discretion would make it easy to rule that a marriage was “falsified” — allowing citizenship to be revoked — in the event of a divorce, even if the couple were married for a decade, Hung said.