Responding to enquires by the local media about a news report in the Hong Kong edition of the Apple Daily yesterday that the Macau Taxi Business Federation had cancelled its planned trip to Taiwan because both the central and local governments “had given orders that Tsai Ing-wen’s authority must be penalised”, Wong Peng Kei, who heads the federation, told the local media last night that the report was not true.
Wong said that considering “the recent changes in the cross-Strait political situation” the board of directors of his federation had decided to replace the 6-day Taiwan tour, which was scheduled to take place between July 4 and 9 with a trip to the mainland. He said the Macau Foundation (FM), which has agreed to subsidise part of the Taiwan tour, had nothing to do with the destination change.
However, the Apple Daily yesterday also uploaded a photo of a statement, which appears to have been released by the federation, to its website as an attachment to its news report. The statement said that both the central and local governments had given orders that “Tsai Ing-wen’s authority must be penalised” because Tsai, who is slated to become Taiwan’s next leader next month, “refuses to recognise the 1992 Consensus”, and that the Macau Foundation had decided that it would “definitely not subsidise” any community organisations’ trips to Taiwan.
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