THE Editor: Not much is being said here about the breakage of relations between the Taiwan side and the Dominican Republic side after decades of ties between the two countries.
From all I have been hearing about it on the TV news, China is putting pressure on developing countries all over the world that have ties to Taiwan for them to break those ties. Before the Dominican Republic in the Caribbean it was Sao Tome and Principe in Africa.
It looks like all China wants to do is to make all countries that have ties with Taiwan break those ties.
As far as I can see, the St. Lucia government is being heavily courted by the Chinese side through the Horse Racing project in Vieux Fort by a Chinese company with government connections. The Chinese know we have ties with Taiwan and still they are pushing the government to break ties with Taiwan and recognize China.
I do not know too much about the division between Taiwan and china, but if we have ties with Taiwan, then China should respect that and don’t try to make our government make us look bad again by doing like a yo-yo and breaking ties once again to give both China and Taiwan the impression that we don’t know what we are about.
China and Taiwan are both bigger and richer than Saint Lucia and both have treated us well, so I do not think we should get involved in their politics. But if we have ties with Taiwan now, it is Taiwan we must support, because it is Taiwan who has been giving us all the support all along.
China gave us the Vieux Fort Stadium and the Millennium Highway psychiatric hospital. Look at them now. The Taiwanese have not given us such big projects, but I was impressed by the long list the present ambassador listed when he started his term of office here.
I think the Government of St. Lucia should watch out for being encouraged to do like Sao Tome and the Dominican Republic. I don’t think we should get involved in their politics, but I feel we should learn from the lessons of all those countries that have broken ties with Taiwan recently, with none of China’s promises delivered, as far as I can sense from the news.
Countries being treated well by Taiwan should not become ungrateful and bite the hands that feed them. Taiwanese money is still paying for the CDP programme that is a daily bread for so many Saint Lucians. The Taiwanese pay for the CDP here, regardless of which government is in office. Has the Chinese ever supported a CDP programme here? They might have, but that might have been before I migrated back home from London.
Like I was saying to my friend just yesterday, the two sides have both treated us well, even though we have got more help from Taiwan than China. But as grateful people, if only for that, we should support Taiwan joining the WHO and the ICAO to be able to give more health help in more places and to allow its people to be able to fly all over the world just like their Chinese brothers and sisters.
I hope you understand my argument.
Jeremy Rollings