A ticking time bomb in cross-Straits ties

On the one hand, the ruling DPP will likely keep fooling Taiwan residents by equivocating about what will be done to maintain the "status quo". On the other, the new education authorities, along with other pro-independence forces, may double their intervention in school education and distort historical facts in textbooks, with the aim of separating "Taiwan history" from Chinese history.

As "torchbearers" of "Taiwan independence" propaganda, Lee and Chen changed "Japanese colonization" into "Japanese governance" and Taiwan's day of liberation into "day of suffering". Several textbooks even outrageously claimed that some Taiwan women "volunteered" to work as comfort women for Japanese soldiers before and during World War II.

After regaining the island's leadership after eight years, the DPP has embarked on the political containment of the Kuomintang, which painstakingly put cross-Straits relations back onto the right track by endorsing the 1992 Consensus during its eight-year rule. It also eyes promoting "independence" as the "only right thing to do", disregarding the island's true history.

Such "de-Sinicization moves" will become a ticking time bomb in cross-Straits exchanges and a major threat to regional stability. Should they manage to solicit public support, it would deal a heavy blow to the ideological foundation for the future reunification and the shared interests of people from both sides.

The truth is, provoking the pro-independence mentality to distract public frustration toward Taiwan's poor economic performance, as Chen did before 2008, will get the DPP nowhere.

The "cultural independence" trick will neither improve local residents' livelihoods nor steer the cross-Straits relationship in the right direction. The mainland, on the other hand, is confident and capable of safeguarding its sovereignty and territorial integrity, and will not sit idle while Taiwan's separatists seek to cross the line. Of course, it needs to keep a close eye on the DPP's "cultural independence" moves and nip them in the bud.

The author is a professor at the Institute of Taiwan Studies of Beijing Union University.