The Face of Taiwan’s Past Is Slowly Fading From View1翻訳

NEW York Tmes
What in the World
By AUSTIN RAMZY AUG. 5, 2016
The Face of Taiwan’s Past Is Slowly Fading From View

You used to see Chiang Kai-shek’s image everywhere in Taiwan. But lately, the man who led the Republic of China for nearly half a century has gradually been disappearing from view.
貴方は、台湾の何処でもチアン・カイシェックの彫像をよく見掛けた。しかし最近中国の共和国を先導したその男は、徐々に風景から姿を消しつつある。

In recent years, statues and busts of Mr. Chiang, who died in 1975, have been removed from prominent locations in scores of parks, schools and government buildings all over the island.
近年、1975年に他界したチアン氏の彫像と胸像は、島中の多くの公園、学校、政府の建物の著名な場所から撤去されている。

These days in Yongkang Park, near where I once lived in central Taipei, one of the statues is hidden in a corner beside a tree. I walked past him regularly for several months before noticing he was even there.
近頃、私が嘗て台北に住んでいた場所の近くのヨンカン公園では、その彫像の一つが、一本の木の側の隅っこに隠してある。私は、彼がそこにいる事に気付かず、何ヶ月も通り過ぎて歩いていた。

20:36 2016/08/07日

Mr. Chiang fled to Taiwan in 1949 after being defeated by Mao Zedong and the Chinese Communist forces in a civil war. Mr. Chiang and his Chinese Nationalist party, or Kuomintang, dominated the island for decades, leading Taiwan as the last remnant of pre-communist China. Today, he is seen by many on the island as an embodiment of authoritarianism, and the diminution of his image has been a symbol of political transformation.

The island began to democratize in the 1980s and ’90s, and the campaign to remove Mr. Chiang’s once-ubiquitous image picked up steam when Chen Shui-bian of the Democratic Progressive Party was president from 2000 to 2008.

Where do the Chiang statues go? More than 200 of them have been moved to a park near his mausoleum in Taoyuan County in northern Taiwan. But thousands still remain in place across the island, including a seated bronze at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in central Taipei. An honor guard keeps an eye on that one, but elsewhere, others are sometimes the targets of graffiti artists ? especially on Feb. 28 of each year, the anniversary of a 1947 massacre of Taiwanese civilians by Kuomintang troops.

Follow Austin Ramzy on Twitter @austinramzy.