Chinese Oscars: Beijing cuts live coverage after winner calls for independent Taiwan

Speech by documentary filmmaker Fu Yue censored after she calls for Taiwan to be recognised as an independent entity

By Benjamin Haas in Seoul

Taiwanese director Fu Yue, left, delivers a speech next to producer Hong Ting Yi after she won best documentary at the 55th Golden Horse Awards in Taipei. 

The Chinese-language version of the Oscars, the Golden Horse Awards, have become the latest flashpoint in tense relations between China and Taiwan after a film director questioned the island’s political status.
Documentary filmmaker Fu Yue called for Taiwan to be recognised as an “independent entity” during her acceptance speech, fighting back tears as she said, “this is my biggest wish as a Taiwanese”. 

Her speech was quickly censored on Chinese television and streams, with the coverage going black.
For decade China has claimed Taiwan as part of its territory, but the island has been independently ruled since 1949, and in the past two decades has become a flourishing democracy in contrast to Beijing’s authoritarian government. 

Chinese officials often bristle at suggestions of Taiwanese independence, and have gone to great lengths to poach Taiwan’s diplomatic allies.

After Fu’s comments, a mainland Chinese actor, Tu Men, echoed Beijing’s line on the status of the island, referring to it as “Taiwan, China”, drawing a rebuke from Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen.
“We have never accepted the phrase “Taiwan, China”, and we never will accept this phrase, Taiwan is simply Taiwan,” Tsai wrote in an online post. 

“I am proud of yesterday’s Golden Horse Awards, which highlights the fact that Taiwan is different from China, and our freedom and diversity is why this is a land where artistic creations can be free.”
Chinese authorities have banned their citizens from participating in the ceremony next year, according to reports in Taiwanese media.
The debate comes ahead of local elections in Taiwan, which are widely seen as a referendum on Tsai’s pro-independence Democratic Progressive party (DPP). 

The controversy quickly spread online, where each side took turns praising or condemning Fu’s actions.

Chinese actress Fan Bingbing, who disappeared earlier this year only to reemerge after admitting to tax evasion, used her now mostly dormant social media account to post a map of China with the phrase “China cannot lose one bit of itself”. 

The image was first posted several years ago by the Communist Youth League, and nationalism has seen a sharp rise under Xi Jinping.
That national fervour may have caused a Chinese runner first place in the Suzhou marathon, after organisers tried to thrust a Chinese flag into her hand during the final stretch of the race. 

After two failed attempts and one Chinese flag thrown to the ground – which itself can result in a three-year prison sentence – the Chinese runner eventually came second behind her Ethiopian rival, trailing by five seconds.

Taiwan Independence

Taiwan's Academy Awards overshadowed by political controversy
By Steven Jiang

Taiwanese director Fu Yue (R) poses backstage after winning Best Documentary for her movie "Our Youth in Taiwan" at the 55th Golden Horse Awards in Taipei on November 17, 2018.

Beijing -- An award acceptance speech by a young Taiwanese filmmaker has stirred passionate reactions on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, pitting some of the region's leading entertainment and political figures against each other just a week before an important election on the self-ruled island.
"I really hope our country will one day be treated as a genuine independent entity," said an emotional Fu Yue, the best documentary winner at Taiwan's annual Golden Horse film awards Saturday, to loud applause and cheers from the audience in Taipei.
"This is my biggest wish as a Taiwanese," the 36-year-old director added.
But when the camera turned to several mainland Chinese movie stars in attendance, including this year's jury chair Gong Li, they appeared stone-faced. 

Taiwan-born and US-based director Ang Lee, a two-time Oscar winner who heads the awards' executive committee, flashed an awkward smile.
When Chinese actor Tu Men walked on stage later, the recipient of last year's best actor award poignantly said he was honored to be a presenter at the Golden Horse ceremony in "Taiwan, China" and that people from both sides of the Taiwan Strait were "family."
The Beijing government considers the self-governed and democratic Taiwan, an island of 23 million people off China's southeastern coast, an integral part of its territory. 

The two sides split in 1949 following the Communist victory on the Chinese mainland after a bloody civil war.
The Golden Horse awards, often called Taiwan's Academy Awards, was founded by the island's authorities in 1962. 

In recent years, however, it has evolved into a major platform for Chinese-language filmmakers around the world to showcase their work, attracting stars from Taiwan, Hong Kong, mainland China and elsewhere -- despite periodic political and military tensions between Taipei and Beijing.

The war of words this year escalated after the award ceremony, with Fu's social media pages inundated with vitriolic comments. 

Numerous Chinese celebrities, including disgraced megastar Fan Bingbing, joined millions of internet users on the mainland to retweet a Chinese map that includes Taiwan with a superimposed national flag.
Even Taiwan's leader waded into the debate, with President Tsai Ing-wen calling the Golden Horse moment a highlight of the island's freedoms and diversity that nurture artistic creativity.
"We have never accepted and will never accept the 'Taiwan, China' label -- Taiwan is Taiwan," she wrote Sunday to her more than two million followers on Facebook. 

"I'm proud of the Golden Horse ceremony yesterday because it accentuated how Taiwan is different from China."
"Nobody will disappear or be censored because of different remarks and we don't have sensitive keywords blocked on the internet," she added, taking a swipe at the Beijing government's notoriously stifling restrictions on freedom of speech.
In their Golden Horse coverage, Chinese media outlets quickly scrubbed clean any references to Fu Yue and her winning documentary "Our Youth in Taiwan," a film about a 2014 student protest movement on the island.
Beijing's official response so far has been relatively subdued, however -- with even Fu's seldom-used account on Weibo, China's equivalent of Twitter, still intact.

Analysts say the Chinese authorities are mindful of their actions' impact on Taiwan's hotly contested local elections this coming Saturday, where Tsai's Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is facing an uphill battle amid a sluggish economy and rising tensions with Beijing.
Following Tsai's rise to power in Taiwan in 2016, relations between Taipei and Beijing have quickly deteriorated. 

The Chinese Communist leadership has hardened its stance because of concerns over strong pro-independence sentiment within Taiwan's ruling party.
The Chinese People's Liberation Army has increased drills around the island while Beijing has repeatedly warned Washington over increasingly close political and military ties with Taipei under US President Donald Trump.
The Beijing government has also worked to poach Taiwan's remaining small number of formal diplomatic allies and squeeze Taipei out of any international gatherings, in addition to ramping up pressure on global companies to drop references to Taiwan as an independent entity.
Despite the vicious attacks she received for her pro-independence speech, Fu has expressed no regrets and brushed aside criticisms that she should have avoided talking politics in a rare platform for cross-strait cultural exchanges.
"I didn't make my remarks 'on an impulse,' or 'instigated by the DPP government' as suggested by some Chinese netizens," she wrote on her Facebook page Sunday. 

"I said what I had always wanted to say about the film."
"My film is about politics," she added. 

"As director, I have to speak for my work."

Taiwan Independence

Olympic Naming Rally Sets Stage for Taiwan Independence Vote

By Brian Hioe

The Formosa Alliance held a rally on Saturday afternoon outside Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) headquarters in Taipei in order to push for a referendum on which name Taiwan will participate under in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

The Formosa Alliance was formed by elder Taiwanese independence activists working together with younger activists inclusive of post-Sunflower Movement Third Force parties.

The referendum being pushed by the Formosa Alliance does not explicitly call for Taiwanese independence, just that Taiwan participate in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as “Taiwan” rather than “Chinese Taipei” or some variant thereof. 

This would be because, despite changes to the Referendum Act in December 2017 lowering the benchmarks needed to hold a nationwide referendum in Taiwan, referendums on the national status of Taiwan or constitution are still not allowed.
Yet while the Formosa Alliance may also hope to appeal to the social mainstream with this broader demand, the clear intent of organizers is to build towards a future referendum on Taiwanese independence.
Organizers claimed that 120,000 were in attendance.
Before the rally, organizers claimed that they expected over 100,000.
The composition of event attendees notably consisted of many people coming from central and southern Taiwan, and the event seems to have been much more advertised through traditional mobilization networks rather than through social media.
For the most part, the event was conducted in Taiwanese, though some speakers spoke in Mandarin, and some indigenous activists were also present.
Solidarity rallies were also conducted in other parts of Taiwan for those who could not make it to the Taipei rally.

Third parties were in attendance, with the New Power Party (NPP), Social Democratic Party (SDP), Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU), and Radical Party taking the stage to stump for 2018 elections and play up their respective parties’ advocacy for securing Taiwan’s sovereignty.
The NPP, however, did face some backlash from the crowd because of its waffling on the issue of support for Taipei mayor Ko Wen-Je 柯文哲, who is increasingly looked at with distaste by the pan-Green camp because of growing closeness with the pan-Blue camp and actions seen as compromising of Taiwanese sovereignty.
Third Force parties notably had many of their candidates from southern Taiwan present for the rally and the Radical Party, which has a stronger base in southern Taiwan, was well-represented, though it is generally not strongly represented in Taiwan.
The SDP also took the stage with a member wearing a Winnie the Pooh costume, in order to mock Chinese dictator Xi Jinping, and the TSU took the stage with some members wearing dinosaur costumes.
The Free Taiwan Party was also present, though it did not take the stage.
After the main rally dispersed, a group of demonstrators moved onto Ketagalan Boulevard, which led to warnings from police to disperse.
Some independent political candidates, most notably Wang Yi-kai 王奕凱, who served as an MC for one of the rally’s numerous stages, were also present.
Speakers included elders of the pan-Green camp, such as former DPP presidential candidate Peng Ming-min 彭明敏 and FTV chair Kuo Pei-hung 郭倍宏, one of the major organizers of the Formosa Alliance, and even Chinese speakers such as Cao Changching 曹長青, who declared his advocacy for Taiwanese independence while on stage, to much fanfare from the crowd.
The several stages set up for the rally radiated outwards from the intersection of Shaoxing Street to Beiping East Road.
Musical performances included hip-hop from Chang Jui-Chuan 張睿銓 and Kou Chou Ching 拷秋勤, band performances from Recycle, among others, and performances by Wang Ming-zhe 王明哲, as well as choral renditions, and a brass band.
Various vendors sold books, t-shirts, pins, and Taiwanese independence-related goods, including activist-humorist Indie DaDee 音地大帝 selling a new board game mocking KMT New Taipei City mayoral candidate Hou You-yi 侯友宜.
A small march of several hundred people also took place.


It remains to be seen how the DPP will react to the demonstration.
The DPP ordered members not to participate in the rally, saying that its workforce was insufficient, and decided to organize its own rally in Kaohsiung today to demonstrate against Chinese annexation rather than demonstrate in favor of changing the name under which Taiwan will participate in the 2020 Olympics.
This did not prevent DPP city council candidates Li Qi-wei 李啟維 of Tainan and Zhou Yong-hong 周永鴻 of Taichung from participating.
Although the DPP has historically pushed for Taiwanese independence, the DPP does not wish to shake the boat regarding cross-Strait relations, adding to accusations that the DPP has become too conservative on that frontier.
We will see whether the DPP will genuinely follow through in taking disciplinary actions against participating party members.
In taking a hard line on the issue and by deciding to hold a separate rally, instead of just being strategically quiet, the DPP may simply inflame backlash from pro-independence deep greens already unhappy with the party’s backsliding on key issues, and further alienate itself from its traditional support base.
This could, however, be to the benefit of Third Force parties and independent politicians.

The ball is in the DPP’s court.
The ruling party could seek other means of blocking the 2020 Olympics referendum through a legal challenge.
The referendum may be quite likely to pass.
As identity polling demonstrates, many members of the public not in favor of Taiwanese independence but in favor of maintaining the status quo on pragmatic grounds may still identify with Taiwan over China and therefore see Taiwan being forced to participate in international sporting events as “Chinese Taipei” as an indignity.
While the Central Election Commission has agreed to hold the referendum, given that the plebiscite is about which name Taiwan will participate in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, in the event of a successful referendum to participate as “Taiwan” rather than “Chinese Taipei” it prompts the question as to whether Japan would support this.
Notably, despite rising tensions between Japan and China, Japan did not vote against China when China coerced the East Asian Olympics organizing committee into stripping Taichung of the hosting rights for the East Asian Youth Games, instead abstaining from the vote.

However, even if Japan were to try and block Taiwan from participating as “Taiwan” rather than “Chinese Taipei,” or even if the DPP takes a hard line against the referendum, organizers would likely achieve their desired aim of strengthening calls for Taiwanese independence.
In this sense, so long as the referendum passes – even if Taiwan ends up being blocked from participating in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as “Taiwan” – referendum organizers will achieve their desired outcome.