Cihu is perennially open daily for visits from 8am to 4pm (though it was closed from December 2007 to May 2008, during the waning months of Chen Shui-bian's administration). Interest in the Burial Place was actually revived this two years as it became embroiled in the then ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s campaign to remove public vestiges of the man many see as a brutal dictator. During those two years, Chiang Kai-shek statues from around Taiwan were relocated to the hillside park near the mausoleum. Prior to the late 1990s, visitors would line up hours for the chance to pay their respects to Chiang Kai-shek (either by bowing three times or saluting before the sarcophagus). Schoolchildren were often bussed in to do the same. At the anniversary of his death on April 5, high-ranking Kuomintang officials would pay homage to the late President in lavish ceremonies. Since democratization of Taiwan during the 1990s, the visitors to Cihu have dwindled in their numbers and the next generation of KMT officials, have visited with less pomp and ceremony. Supporters of Taiwan independence (and pro-independence leaders such as Chen Shui-bian) do not visit the site due to their dislike for Chiang Kai-shek—a leader whom they viewed as one who imposed authoritarian rule on Taiwan.