Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) has signed up to the Democratic Progressive Party's (DPP) signature drive to hold a referendum to recover the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) stolen assets, the DPP confirmed yesterday.
Answering reporters' inquiries, DPP Chairman Yu Shyi-kun said Lee's endorsement was passed on to him at a dinner on June 20 through Ng Chiau-tong (
"Ng told me that Lee had endorsed it [the referendum] a long time ago ... I felt very happy when Ng handed the signature to me. I also told him he could have given it to me in public," Yu said.
Yu, however, said Ng did not tell him why Lee, a former KMT chairman, had decided to join the campaign.
Yu said he did not think Lee's endorsement contradicted his former role as KMT chairman, adding that those who have publicly promised but failed to return the KMT's stolen assets to the Taiwanese people -- such as KMT presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) -- are the ones contradicting themselves.
The DPP initiated the campaign last November and reached its goal of collecting over 1.4 million signatures last month.
The Referendum Law (公投法) states that a referendum cannot be held unless 5 percent of the nation's eligible voters, or 830,000 people, endorse a referendum proposal.
"Lee believes the KMT's assets are a product of history. He endorsed the campaign because he hopes all political parties in the nation can compete fairly," said Chou Mei-li (周美里), a spokeswoman for the Taiwan Solidarity Union, of which Lee is the spiritual leader.
Asked for comments, DPP caucus whip Wang Tuoh (
"Recovering the stolen assets is a common goal of many people, including some KMT and People First Party members ... It is also a matter of right and wrong," DPP presidential candidate Frank Hsieh (
Approached for comments at the same event, Ma said he was "surprised" to learn of Lee's endorsement and "did not understand why" Lee had participated in the campaign because Lee had been responsible for dealing with many of the party's assets when he was KMT chairman.
KMT Chairman Wu Po-hsiung (吳伯雄) said the KMT's party-owned enterprises made a lot of money when Lee was party chairman, adding that it was the number of enterprises the party owned that had upset people back then.
"I assure everyone that we will not run any enterprises and will not make any money from them anymore," he said.
Wu said the KMT is now so poor that it has difficulty paying party staffers' salaries.
"What the KMT wants now is to fulfill its social responsibilities. After all, taking care of retired party staffers and giving party officials paychecks is also a social responsibility," he said.
In a related development, Ma yesterday dismissed speculation that he asked his running mate, former premier Vincent Siew (
Wu also downplayed the speculation, saying the KMT is only trying to "make more friends."
Hsieh, however, criticized Ma, saying: "It is important for someone to be consistent rather than try to get close to certain people only ahead of elections."
Responding to Lee's support for the referendum campaign, KMT Secretary-General Wu Den-yi (
The period when Lee was KMT chairman was the most energetic in terms of the management of the party's assets, Wu said. The party made huge amounts of money and also suffered great losses, he said.
KMT caucus whip Hsu Shao-ping (
KMT Legislator Shuai Hua-ming (
Meanwhile, Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (
"It's a normal thing." Wang said, adding that Lee would help win over KMT pro-localization voters.
Additional reporting by Shih Hsiu-chuan
FALSE DOCUMENTS? Actor William Liao said he was ‘voluntarily cooperating’ with police after a suspect was accused of helping to produce false medical certificates Police yesterday questioned at least six entertainers amid allegations of evasion of compulsory military service, with Lee Chuan (李銓), a member of boy band Choc7 (超克7), and actor Daniel Chen (陳大天) among those summoned. The New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office in January launched an investigation into a group that was allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified medical documents. Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) has been accused of being one of the group’s clients. As the investigation expanded, investigators at New Taipei City’s Yonghe Precinct said that other entertainers commissioned the group to obtain false documents. The main suspect, a man surnamed
DEMOGRAPHICS: Robotics is the most promising answer to looming labor woes, the long-term care system and national contingency response, an official said Taiwan is to launch a five-year plan to boost the robotics industry in a bid to address labor shortages stemming from a declining and aging population, the Executive Yuan said yesterday. The government approved the initiative, dubbed the Smart Robotics Industry Promotion Plan, via executive order, senior officials told a post-Cabinet meeting news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s population decline would strain the economy and the nation’s ability to care for vulnerable and elderly people, said Peter Hong (洪樂文), who heads the National Science and Technology Council’s (NSTC) Department of Engineering and Technologies. Projections show that the proportion of Taiwanese 65 or older would
Democracies must remain united in the face of a shifting geopolitical landscape, former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) told the Copenhagen Democracy Summit on Tuesday, while emphasizing the importance of Taiwan’s security to the world. “Taiwan’s security is essential to regional stability and to defending democratic values amid mounting authoritarianism,” Tsai said at the annual forum in the Danish capital. Noting a “new geopolitical landscape” in which global trade and security face “uncertainty and unpredictability,” Tsai said that democracies must remain united and be more committed to building up resilience together in the face of challenges. Resilience “allows us to absorb shocks, adapt under
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said it is building nine new advanced wafer manufacturing and packaging factories this year, accelerating its expansion amid strong demand for high-performance computing (HPC) and artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The chipmaker built on average five factories per year from 2021 to last year and three from 2017 to 2020, TSMC vice president of advanced technology and mask engineering T.S. Chang (張宗生) said at the company’s annual technology symposium in Hsinchu City. “We are quickening our pace even faster in 2025. We plan to build nine new factories, including eight wafer fabrication plants and one advanced
RSS