News Article - ATAYAL - The worldwide voice of the aboriginal tribes of Taiwan

CIP approves bill to recognize Kavalan aborigines

As published in Taiwan News on 11/2/2002
by Jason Pan

The Kavalan communities in the regions of Ilan, Hualien, and Taitung are celebrating their official recognition by the government as Taiwan's 11th aboriginal group, and the first of the lowland aboriginal groups to obtain official status. The Cabinet-level Council of Indigenous Peoples approved the designation at a meeting on Thursday. Despite the success after many decades of struggle, many Kavalan and aboriginal activists said the decision smacked of political expediency. The government was accused of not going far enough, as other plains aboriginal (Ping-pu) groups are still fighting for official status recognition. The CIP draft bill called for granting of indigenous status to only some of the Kavalan communities, limited to a list of 1,073 persons who are of Kavalan descent but currently registered erroneously as Amis aborigines in east coast counties. "It is not a true step forward for the Ping-pu plains aborigines. The government took the easy way out and gave official indigenous status only to Kavalan persons who already held such status, but were registered as Amis because of past administrative oversights. This seemed to us like political opportunism for the government to show its concern for Kavalan people, when in fact the decision denies many of our people official recognition," said Bauki-Anao, the Kavalan representative member on the CIP. "There are several thousands more Kavalan people in more than 40 communities in Ilan, Hualien, and Taitung. They were ignored by this bill and probably have no chance of having their indigenous status recognized," continued Bauki-Anao. "The Council of Indigenous Peoples must address this historic injustice, and return our status as aboriginal people which rightfully belongs to us. Other Ping-pu aborigine groups also are demanding their right to official recognition, but the CIP has ignored us repeatedly," contended Bauki-Anao yesterday when speaking to the Taiwan News. Belonging to the ancient Indo-Pacific Austronesian ethnic family, the Kavalan people are classified as one of an acknowledged twelve Ping-pu plains aboriginal groups, who lived in the lowlands, river valleys, and coastal areas. Taiwan also has mountain highland aborigines. According to the classification given by anthropologists, aside from the Kavalan people, Taiwan's plains aborigines also include Ketagalan, Siraya, Pazeh, Makatao, Taokas, Papora, Babuza, Hoanya, Kakabu, Tavolong, and Kau-kaut groups. Many Ping-pu groups have suffered assimilation and drops in population due to migrants and settlers who came from China and colonial powers over the past 400 years. Much of the Ping-pu peoples' history, language, culture, traditional customs, agriculture and hunting practices, and their community existence are well-documented in the historical records about the "Formosan Aborigines."

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