The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) must take full responsibility for his missteps in dealing with Typhoon Morakot and should immediately launch a Cabinet reshuffle in order to improve relief efforts.
“We can tell he offered a sincere apology but we are not sure what he apologized for,” said DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), referring to a press conference Ma held yesterday afternoon.
Tsai said the two-hour press conference with local and foreign journalists failed to restore public confidence and did not map out a concrete plan for the ongoing relief work.
‘MALFUNCTION’
The biggest problem of the administration in the past week, she said, is a “leadership and command system malfunction,” adding that unless a new team is named right away, the same problems will reoccur.
“At the moment, the plan to recall or to topple the Cabinet initiated by the DPP is not the most effective option. The best solution is for this president to immediately reshuffle the Cabinet,” Tsai told reporters.
She added that the DPP did not mind if the government waited until early next month — the timetable set out by Ma — to issue demerits to responsible officials, but stressed that a Cabinet reshuffle must happen right away.
The DPP does not rule out working with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in pressuring Ma to restructure his Cabinet now that the KMT might have its own political considerations, she said.
KMT CRITICISM
Lawmakers from the KMT also called for a major Cabinet reshuffle.
KMT Legislator Lo Shu-lei (羅淑蕾) said Central Emergency Operations Center Commander Mao Chi-kuo (毛治國) and chiefs of the National Fire Agency, the Ministry of National Defense, the Water Resources Agency and the Council of Agriculture should all be replaced.
Lo urged Ma to choose People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) to be the next premier, saying that Soong’s experience as former Taiwan governor made him the best candidate to assume premiership.
Lin Huo-wang (林火旺), national advisor to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), also suggested Ma reshuffle the Cabinet because of its poor performance in the rescue operation.
Lin made the remarks after he described the Cabinet as a “cold-blooded government” on TVBS’ political talk show, 2100 Public Talk, on Monday night.
“On the night of August 11, Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) went to have his hair dyed,” Lin said on the show. “Dyeing hair is a time-consuming job. [Liu] was also seen talking cheerfully on phone ... People were dying. If this government feels numb to that, Mr Ma will have to take responsibility for not replacing [the premier], who is not the right person for the job.”
Lin said Executive Yuan Secretary-General Hsueh Hsiang-chuan (薛香川) had dinner at the five-star Howard Hotel on Aug. 9.
He also said that when Minister of the Interior Liao Liou-yi (廖了以) asked Vice Premier Paul Chiu (邱正雄) on Aug. 9 over the phone whether the army should be mobilized, Chiu asked Liao: Is the situation that serious?”
“If [Ma] continues to let these officials keep their positions, he is committing a sin,” Lin said.
Hsueh called in to the show and rebutted the allegations. He first denied he went to the hotel on Aug. 9, and when Lin repeatedly asked him when he had gone to the hotel, Hsueh said: “It was on Aug. 8.”
“I went to Kaohsiung by the first train the next day … Besides, [August 8] was Father’s Day,” Hsueh said. “It’s Father’s Day. We left the hotel right away after the dinner. Come on. Was it that unreasonable that we had dinner out on Father’s Day?”
Liu’s office declined to comment on Lin’s remarks yesterday, but the office’s Ting Nai-chi (丁乃琪) was quoted by the Chinese-language **China Times** yesterday as saying: “Wasn’t [he] allowed to have his hair cut? What kind of world is this?”
Chiu’s office, meanwhile, issued a statement saying that Lin’s allegation was not true.
At a press conference yesterday afternoon, Ma came to Liu’s defense and said it was a regular appointment for a haircut.
Liu was not present at the press conference.
Chiu, who sat next to Ma, dismissed the accusations concerning him as “completely false,” adding that he has been working hard at the disaster response center since the typhoon struck and that he didn’t even have time for breakfast yesterday.
Ma told the press conference that he and Liu had come to an agreement that punishments would not be meted out until early next month because the first priority was disaster relief and they did not want to damage morale during the relief effort.
Ma said the government was determined to find out why the public thought the government had reacted too slowly to the emergency. If any government official was found to have made careless mistakes, they should take the political and administrative responsibility, he said.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY KO SHU-LING AND FLORA WANG
CALL FOR SUPPORT: President William Lai called on lawmakers across party lines to ensure the livelihood of Taiwanese and that national security is protected President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday called for bipartisan support for Taiwan’s investment in self-defense capabilities at the christening and launch of two coast guard vessels at CSBC Corp, Taiwan’s (台灣國際造船) shipyard in Kaohsiung. The Taipei (台北) is the fourth and final ship of the Chiayi-class offshore patrol vessels, and the Siraya (西拉雅) is the Coast Guard Administration’s (CGA) first-ever ocean patrol vessel, the government said. The Taipei is the fourth and final ship of the Chiayi-class offshore patrol vessels with a displacement of about 4,000 tonnes, Lai said. This ship class was ordered as a result of former president Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) 2018
UKRAINE, NVIDIA: The US leader said the subject of Russia’s war had come up ‘very strongly,’ while Jenson Huang was hoping that the conversation was good Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and US President Donald Trump had differing takes following their meeting in Busan, South Korea, yesterday. Xi said that the two sides should complete follow-up work as soon as possible to deliver tangible results that would provide “peace of mind” to China, the US and the rest of the world, while Trump hailed the “great success” of the talks. The two discussed trade, including a deal to reduce tariffs slapped on China for its role in the fentanyl trade, as well as cooperation in ending the war in Ukraine, among other issues, but they did not mention
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi yesterday lavished US President Donald Trump with praise and vows of a “golden age” of ties on his visit to Tokyo, before inking a deal with Washington aimed at securing critical minerals. Takaichi — Japan’s first female prime minister — pulled out all the stops for Trump in her opening test on the international stage and even announced that she would nominate him for a Nobel Peace Prize, the White House said. Trump has become increasingly focused on the Nobel since his return to power in January and claims to have ended several conflicts around the world,
GLOBAL PROJECT: Underseas cables ‘are the nervous system of democratic connectivity,’ which is under stress, Member of the European Parliament Rihards Kols said The government yesterday launched an initiative to promote global cooperation on improved security of undersea cables, following reported disruptions of such cables near Taiwan and around the world. The Management Initiative on International Undersea Cables aims to “bring together stakeholders, align standards, promote best practices and turn shared concerns into beneficial cooperation,” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said at a seminar in Taipei. The project would be known as “RISK,” an acronym for risk mitigation, information sharing, systemic reform and knowledge building, he said at the seminar, titled “Taiwan-Europe Subsea Cable Security Cooperation Forum.” Taiwan sits at a vital junction on
RSS