Amid escalating tensions in the Taiwan Strait, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislator Lin Yi-jin announced a proposal to rename the "Act Governing Relations between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area" (Cross-Strait People Relations Act) to the "Act Governing Relations between the People of Taiwan and the People’s Republic of China." According to reports, the proposal has already earned the endorsement of more than 20 DPP legislators.
Lin Yi-jin wrote on Facebook that the legislative co-signing was completed on the morning of the 2nd, expressing hope to enshrine in law the principle of a "nation-to-nation relationship between Taiwan and the People’s Republic of China on equal footing."
"Opposing the Domestication of the Taiwan Strait Issue"
She continued: "This action serves not only to highlight our country's resistance to aggression and colonialism, and our opposition to making Taiwan Strait issues solely an internal affair, but it is also a significant international statement. We want Taiwan’s democratic allies to know that, although the Kuomintang and Taiwan People’s Party are causing chaos in the legislature, ‘pro-China and selling out Taiwan' is by no means representative of mainstream public opinion in our country."
Lin Yi-jin said that Taiwan and the People's Republic of China “have always been two separate countries, and Taiwan has never been under the control of the People's Republic of China—not even for a single day. These are international basic facts. However, some of our laws are still oblivious to this reality and continue to regulate cross-strait relations with wishful thinking, and the ‘Cross-Strait People Relations Act’ is one example.”
Lin continued that for this reason, in addition to proposing the renaming of the act to the "Act Governing Relations between the People of Taiwan and the People’s Republic of China," she is also suggesting removal of terms like “prior to national unification” and the use of “regions” to refer to both sides in the original text, “so that all articles further reflect the basic facts.”
Not the First Time DPP Legislators Proposed Amendment
On May 8, 2020, DPP legislator Tsai Yi-yu also proposed a similar motion, calling for the phrase “prior to national unification” to be changed to “in response to national development,” as well as amending mentions of “national unification” in Articles 26-1 and 63.
However, after facing opposition from both sides of the political spectrum, Tsai Yi-yu announced on May 15 of the same year that he was withdrawing the proposal on account of "Taiwan’s future" and "stability of the situation."