No one bothered to inform the residents why the southern tip of their island was no longer accessible. All they knew was that the place where women for generations had scavenged tidal pools for crabs and where peasants had long worked fields of taro and millet had suddenly become the site of a construction site. building. Rumors began to circulate. It was a pineapple processor. No, it was a fish processor. Whatever it was, they decided, it would mean more jobs for the islanders.
It wasn’t until years later, in 1980, when a local pastor saw an article in a newspaper, that the islanders discovered what the site actually was: a massive nuclear waste dump.
“The government misled us,” Pastor Syapen Lamoran, 76, said recently at his home on Lanyu, a lush volcanic island off the southeast coast of Taiwan that is the traditional home of the Tao, one of 16 indigenous tribes. officially recognized in Taiwan. “They didn’t care that nuclear waste would kill us, that the Tao people would become extinct.”
Decades after that revelation, the dump remains a painful reminder to the Tao of the government’s broken promises. The site has been one of the highest-profile causes waged by indigenous Taiwanese, who were the main inhabitants of these islands until four centuries ago, when settlers began arriving from China, Europe and, later, imperial Japan. Today, ethnic Han Chinese make up more than 95 percent of Taiwan’s population of 23 million. The approximately 583,000 indigenous people, by contrast, make up 2 percent, and many still face marginalization. Lanyu, also known as Orchid Island, or Ponso no Tao, has just over 5,000 inhabitants.
The Tao have fought to persuade the government to remove the nuclear waste facility. For years they organized mass protests on the island and in front of government offices in Taipei, the capital of Taiwan. But despite repeated government promises to relocate the site, the dump remains. Taiwanese officials have said that residents’ exposure to low levels of radiation from the dump has been minimal, citing numerous scientific studies.
In 2018, the government published a report acknowledging that it did not consult the islanders about the construction of the site. Authorities agreed to pay the Tao $83 million in compensation, with an additional $7 million to be disbursed every three years.
The most ardent activists have scorned the payments. Others are less bothered. Many young Tao say they have little interest in pursuing a campaign that has consumed much of their elders’ time. For them, the focus today is on tourism, as hordes of young Taiwanese visit the island.
“Promoting Tao culture is much more important than repeating the same old song,” said Si Yabosoganen, 34, lounging on the patio of his seaside bar.
But for the older generation, eliminating the nuclear dump is a cause worth fighting for. “We don’t have any mattress. This island is our only home,” said Sinan Jipehngaya, 50, the owner of the Anti-Nuclear Bar in Lanyu.
By: AMY QIN and AMY CHANG CHIEN
BBC-NEWS-SRC: http://www.nytsyn.com/subscribed/stories/6527251, IMPORTING DATE: 2023-01-11 23:50:08
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