Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) called for solidarity as he was sworn in as party chairman yesterday.
"We lost in the first half of the game, but we must win back confidence, hope and integrity in the second half," he said, referring to the legislative elections last Saturday and the presidential election on March 22.
Hsieh said the party had its back to the wall.
"We can only march forward and work hard," he said. "We are in a similar state to when the party was established 20 years ago. Apart from a nearly meaningless minority in the legislature, we have nothing. We must fight to survive."
Hsieh said he realized the presidential contest would be a tough one and expected the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) to exploit the results of the legislative elections.
Saying the DPP had no option but to unite, Hsieh said the onus was on the party to convince the public that a divided government could function.
RATIONALIZATION
During the party Central Executive Committee meeting that followed the swearing-in ceremony, Hsieh asked the party's newly elected legislators-at-large to establish joint service centers in light of the fact that the party's number of seats had been dramatically reduced.
Hsieh also asked the Executive Yuan to work out a plan to subsidize low-income individuals who cannot afford to pay their health insurance bills.
The committee, meanwhile, agreed that former DPP legislator Tuan Yi-kang (
Amid calls for certain Cabinet officials to be held responsible for the party's elections defeat, DPP Central Standing Committee member Huang Ching-lin (
inappropriate
Hsieh said after the committee meeting that it was inappropriate to apportion blame and that those bent on doing so should not be involved in the party's presidential campaign.
He likened these critics to camels in a caravan that were too tired, hungry or thirsty to continue.
Huang Ching-lin said Hsieh's comment was inappropriate and urged the presidential candidate to keep everyone onboard for the sake of party unity.
Hsieh said he had not addressed his comment at anyone in particular.
DPP Cultural and Information Department Director Hsieh Hsin-ni (謝欣霓) said the party would listen to the public and it was meaningless to hold anyone accountable for the election defeat.
"We could have criticized ourselves and debated where we went wrong, but we don't have much time for that because the presidential election is looming," she said.
Right-wing political scientist Laura Fernandez on Sunday won Costa Rica’s presidential election by a landslide, after promising to crack down on rising violence linked to the cocaine trade. Fernandez’s nearest rival, economist Alvaro Ramos, conceded defeat as results showed the ruling party far exceeding the threshold of 40 percent needed to avoid a runoff. With 94 percent of polling stations counted, the political heir of outgoing Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves had captured 48.3 percent of the vote compared with Ramos’ 33.4 percent, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal said. As soon as the first results were announced, members of Fernandez’s Sovereign People’s Party
MORE RESPONSIBILITY: Draftees would be expected to fight alongside professional soldiers, likely requiring the transformation of some training brigades into combat units The armed forces are to start incorporating new conscripts into combined arms brigades this year to enhance combat readiness, the Executive Yuan’s latest policy report said. The new policy would affect Taiwanese men entering the military for their compulsory service, which was extended to one year under reforms by then-president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in 2022. The conscripts would be trained to operate machine guns, uncrewed aerial vehicles, anti-tank guided missile launchers and Stinger air defense systems, the report said, adding that the basic training would be lengthened to eight weeks. After basic training, conscripts would be sorted into infantry battalions that would take
GROWING AMBITIONS: The scale and tempo of the operations show that the Strait has become the core theater for China to expand its security interests, the report said Chinese military aircraft incursions around Taiwan have surged nearly 15-fold over the past five years, according to a report released yesterday by the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) Department of China Affairs. Sorties in the Taiwan Strait were previously irregular, totaling 380 in 2020, but have since evolved into routine operations, the report showed. “This demonstrates that the Taiwan Strait has become both the starting point and testing ground for Beijing’s expansionist ambitions,” it said. Driven by military expansionism, China is systematically pursuing actions aimed at altering the regional “status quo,” the department said, adding that Taiwan represents the most critical link in China’s
EMERGING FIELDS: The Chinese president said that the two countries would explore cooperation in green technology, the digital economy and artificial intelligence Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday called for an “equal and orderly multipolar world” in the face of “unilateral bullying,” in an apparent jab at the US. Xi was speaking during talks in Beijing with Uruguayan President Yamandu Orsi, the first South American leader to visit China since US special forces captured then-Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro last month — an operation that Beijing condemned as a violation of sovereignty. Orsi follows a slew of leaders to have visited China seeking to boost ties with the world’s second-largest economy to hedge against US President Donald Trump’s increasingly unpredictable administration. “The international situation is fraught
RSS