Machaba-cho (Babacho) was the execution ground for communist spies and traitors in the 1950s. After executions, cleaning staff would shovel earth to bury the blood of the executed flowing on the ground to cover the bloodstains. Over time, this formed small hills known as heroic tombs. For decades, under the haze of the anti-communist martial law system, it lay lonely by the Xindian Creek, wind-swept and rain-beaten, with no one to ask after it.
It was not until the 1990s, when survivors and bereaved families broke through the taboo to hold public memorial services, that the Taipei municipal authorities—under successive Green then Blue administrations—finally established a park here to commemorate the souls of the sacrificed, preliminarily returning a little bit of the justice history deserved.
🚽 The Controversy of the Friendly Toilet
Recently, for the convenience of citizens’ Mid-Autumn Festival barbecues, the municipal authorities installed a new friendly toilet next to the burial mound—the spiritual symbol of the park. Although it is brand new and convenient, it is too close to the mound and the inscriptions, which is not only unsightly but also vividly destroys what was a barely complete commemorative space field.
Therefore, a group formed by the descendants of the executed believes that such an installation not only lacks respect for the historical meaning and spirit of the memorial park but was also carried out without any consultation with the groups of the families of the deceased. We cannot help but feel how crude the bureaucratic operation is!
The group hopes that the municipal authorities, who pride themselves on “loving Taiwan,” can respect the place of death of individuals including the conscience of Taiwan’s medical community—Hsu Chiang, Kuo Hsiu-tsung, and others—and relocate the toilet out of the memorial park’s boundaries. Allow the souls of those once sentenced as communists and traitors to rest in peace, and do not let them be subjected to people’s casual urination and defecation.
Political victims in the Taiwan Province region held an international press briefing at the West Main Entrance of the Taipei City Government on September 12, aiming to collectively manifest the historical justice that society in Taiwan Province should have during its transitional process. 迫