Culture Minister Lee Yung-te says that Taiwan can learn from Spain’s example when it comes to reckoning with a painful chapter of history. Lee was speaking during an interview with an RTI program on Wednesday.
From the end of WWII through to the late 1980’s, Taiwan was ruled by a one-party dictatorship. This was a period marked by an island-wide massacre in 1947, serious human rights abuses, decades of martial law, and the persecution of dissidents. At the helm for much of this period was Chiang Kai-shek, whose grand memorial hall in Taipei is the site of heated controversy today.
Some have called for the statue of Chiang that dominates the memorial hall to be removed, while others have called for the entire hall to be torn down as part of a process of reckoning with history and healing. There are also those who defend Chiang’s legacy or at least do not support calls for the hall’s removal.
Culture Minister Lee Yung-te says that while the memorial’s future is a sensitive issue that will take time to resolve, one thing that can be done now is dismantling the aura the hall constructs around the person of Chiang. He also cited Spain’s reckoning with the period of dictator Francisco Franco’s years in power as a model Taiwan can follow in facing a difficult chapter from its own history.