Taiwan scraps holidays for late president Chiang Kai-shek

Aug 29, 2007, 15:10 GMT

Taipei - In a more further to erase the influence of the controversial late president Chiang Kai-shek, Taiwan Wednesday scrapped two public holidays commemorating him.

The Interior Ministry said it had cancelled the two holidays, one marking Chiang's birthday on December 31 and the other marking his death on April 5.

'These holidays are products of the dictatorial period. As Taiwan is transforming from dictatorship to justice, it is no longer appropriate to commemorate Chiang Kai-shek with national holidays,' Interior Minister Lee Yi-yang said.

Chiang lost the Chinese Civil War to the Communists and fled to Taiwan in 1949 to set up his government-in-exile.

From then until he died in 1975, he ruled Taiwan with an iron grip. His son Chiang Ching-kuo, a moderate refromist, ruled Taiwan from 1978 until he died in 1988, ending the Chiang Dynasty.

In 2000, Chiang's Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang or KMT) lost the presidential election to the Taiwan natives' the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Since then, the pro-independence KMT has tried to cut links with China and erase the legacies of Chiang.

The movement gained momentum in October 2006 when President Chen Shui-bian's government began to topple Chiang statues and remove 'Chiang Kai-shek' and 'China' from enterprise names.

Since then, Taiwan has renamed the Chiang Kai-shek International Airport as the Taoyuan International Airport; Chunghwa ('Chinese') Telecom to Taiwan Telecom; and Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall to Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall.