Relax without relaxation
According to a report by Taiwan’s Central Radio: “The vice-chairman of the Mainland Affairs Council, Qiu Chuizheng, said on the 21st that the government plans to open up Hong Kong and Macao professionals to work in Taiwan and stay in Taiwan for 5 consecutive years. After meeting the relevant conditions, they can apply to settle in Taiwan. The new measures are planned. The announcement will take effect on May 1.” The Hong Kong media also quickly released relevant news reports. As a gossip person, the first thing I do is to read the messages of Hong Kong people under the relevant news reports. Comparing with the congratulations and thanks from the sky when Ms. Tsai Ing-wen was elected president, Hong Kong people seem to have returned to their original faces. Among the messages I have read temporarily, none of the messages expressed gratitude to the Taiwan government. The messages are roughly divided into the following categories. kind:
The first category considers only superficial relaxation. Taiwan's immigration policy is changing day by day, and the approval system is not transparent. After 5 years, you may not be able to stay if you meet the conditions. It is better to go directly to the United Kingdom.
The second category is based on the Wang Xi incident and the online remarks of some Taiwanese people who believe that Taiwanese do not welcome Hong Kongers.
The third group believes that Taiwan's democracy, politics, policies and laws lag behind other democracies
The fourth category is that Taiwan will be reunified sooner or later, and immigrating to Taiwan seems meaningless.
For the first type of message, I have witnessed it with my own eyes. Some of my friends were born in the mainland and were not approved to settle due to national security reasons. The wife of one of my Hong Kong friends has truthfully declared that she was born in the mainland when applying for investment immigration. Since the Taiwan authorities have national security concerns, they should reject the friend's application from the beginning. The interesting thing is that people came to Taiwan and their money was invested. In the end, the application for settlement was not approved, but the Immigration Bureau allowed a friend’s family to stay in Taiwan as a business, and the residence permit was renewed every two years. My friend was pissed off. It turns out that holding a residence permit will not damage national security? Faced with this contradictory way of doing things, my friend finally left Taiwan with his family. A friend of mine was once rejected because he worked in a large organization, just because the largest shareholder of this large organization is the Hong Kong government. The Taiwan Immigration Department's point of view should be that such people are equivalent to civil servants who have served the Hong Kong government. Political opinions are very illusory things. It is difficult for ordinary people to prove the real political opinions in their heads. Does working for the Hong Kong government mean that they are pro-CCP? But this kind of thing can only be decided by the Immigration Department. There are also friends who were directly rejected because they tried to immigrate through the opportunity of investment immigration. The first time I heard this reason, I laughed. Of course, investment immigration is for immigrating to Taiwan. My friend's business does not contribute enough to Taiwan, and it is just a facade business for the eventual immigrant to Taiwan, but the problem is that when the friend submits the investment immigration plan, the authorities do not explain in detail what is a contributing business when approving the plan, such as the prescribed business volume, tax etc. In fact, my friend's business is quite famous in the local area and earns a lot of money every month. I was serious about doing investment business, but in the end, I was not approved for the application for settlement.
As for the second, third, and fourth types of comments, they can be roughly classified as different views derived from different angles. The tone of these comments I have seen is considered polite, so as a crapshoot, I am happy to interpret these comments. Based on my own experience, I have been in Taiwan for more than a year and a half. Except that I went to the bank to open a savings account not long after I arrived, and the bank staff are not very skilled in opening accounts for non-Taiwanese people, I have not encountered too many problems in my life. Inconvenience on multiple social levels. There are many foreigners working and studying in Taiwan. The bank should have clear guidelines for opening an account, but it seems that my friends and I are quite tossed to open an account with Hong Kong passports, but it took a while to open an account. As for Taiwanese not welcoming Hongkongers, I have never been discriminated against. I have met a bunch of Taiwanese friends who are playful and friendly, and my Taiwanese neighbors are also very happy. There should be very few Taiwanese who yell at Hong Kong people on the Internet. I haven't met them in real life yet. It is said that some Hong Kong people themselves have made some rude remarks to Taiwanese and mainlanders on the Internet, right?
Friends in Hong Kong saw the news and asked me if they would apply to settle in Taiwan by taking advantage of the new relaxation measures. When I answered "no", I became interested in the word "professional", and wondered if I would be a little bit in line. So I studied "professionals" very seriously. According to the Taiwan government's foreign professional talent recruitment and employment law consultation page, professional talents are divided into ten fields, including: technology/economy/education/culture and art/sports/finance/ Special expertise in law/architecture/defense/other fields seems to cover everything. I further read an 85-page detailed description of what professionals in various fields are. In short, basically those who meet the requirements of professionals are the elites in their fields, entrepreneurs, bank executives, artists, Scientists... After reading this, I feel red-faced for thinking I've ever thought about getting a little bit of a sidekick. My friend and I laughed and said, "I'm far away from professionals. Fortunately, I didn't think about applying for settlement. Otherwise, I would be beaten to the point of losing my will to be a human being."
It's not my business, and it doesn't mean that there are no elites in Hong Kong. For example, my younger sister definitely fits. But this relaxation continues to be unattractive in my opinion, and the conditions are still harsh. Professionals who meet the time and income requirements for stay can "apply for settlement." ”, it is not that you will get permanent status in Taiwan if you meet the conditions, while British BNO immigrants can get permanent status after living for five years. As a professional, why spend the same amount of time and take the risk of uncertainty to apply to come to Taiwan? Coupled with the case of Hong Kong people's investment immigration being blocked earlier, people who originally intended to immigrate to Taiwan should have seen it from the news. Not to mention that a bunch of elites have already gone to the UK, and the rest are either determined to stay or have other fetters that cannot be left for the time being. Apart from civil servants, Chinese-funded and government-funded private institutions, how many Hong Kong elites are left? Will you choose to come to Taiwan? I believe the numbers must be pitiful.
On the same day that Taiwan announced that it was ready to open up residency applications for professionals from Hong Kong and Macau, there was another piece of news that Bank of America was relocating some of its dealmaking staff from Hong Kong to Singapore. In the past year, I have seen a lot of news about the flow of funds and talents from Hong Kong to Singapore. The Taiwan authorities have time to throw out rhetorical measures that are not realized. It is better to consider how to adjust the strict foreign exchange management system and introduce investor-friendly measures. It is more practical to take a piece of the pie from Singapore.
Open to Hong Kong and Macao professionals to apply for settlement: https://www.rti.org.tw/news/view/id/2130692
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