Formosan Regime ‘Not Democratic’

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29907, 22 August 1962, Page 13

Formosan Regime ‘Not Democratic’

(N.Z. Press Association-Copyright) LONDON, August 21. The Chinese Nationalist Government did not offer a democratic alternative to the Communist regime, “The Times” said yesterday.

“The minor parties that exist in Formosa are as powerless and formal appendages as those harnessed to the Communists on the mainland," the newspaper said in an editorial.

answer still widely accepted was that Japanese aggression had undermined the authority of the Kuomintang Government and created conditions of chaos in which Communist guerrillas could thrive.

It was analysing the reasons for the failure of the Kuomintang, or National People’s Party, founded 50 years ago by Sun Yat-sen and later taken over by Chiang Kai-shek. The editorial said one

But the history of the party showed failings going farther back than that. The party had never offered a democratic alternative to the Communists and did not now.

The party had failed to evolve any coherent political policy and a practical programme of reform. “Yet there was a zealous young China emerging in the 1920's that was not lost to the Communist: till much later. It might have built on Sun’s foundation if the Kuomintang party had given it a home and a voice,” the editorial said.

One failure lay in the military domination of the party following soon after Sun’s departure.

In attempting to suppress the warlords and unify China, Chiang’s methods were little different from the warlords themselves. The editorial said the old repression still persisted in political life on Formosa. Many of the old men were still in power. The Kuomintang had no appeal to the younger generation on Formosa whether they came from the mainland or were native' Formosans.