The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday announced that a former top aide to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) would take over as party secretary-general.
The party confirmed that Ma had invited his former top aide and deputy city mayor, King Pu-tsung (金溥聰), to assist him with party affairs. King, currently a visiting scholar at the Brookings Institution in Washington, is expected to return to Taiwan later this month.
“We expect Mr King to bring more energy to the KMT and initiate bold and creative moves to help with party reform,” KMT spokesman Lee Chien-jung (李建榮) said after the party’s Central Standing Committee (CSC) meeting.
KMT Secretary-General Chan Chun-po (詹春柏), who also doubles as KMT vice chairman, will continue to serve as vice chairman while assisting King with party affairs, Lee said.
King, 54, played a major role in Ma’s previous campaigns, helping him win the Taipei City mayoral elections in 1998 and 2001, and the presidential election last year.
King’s first major task would be the campaign for the special municipality elections next year.
Before the KMT confirmed King’s new position, King had dismissed a report by the Chinese-language United Daily News earlier yesterday that he would return to “save” Ma from plummeting popularity by taking on the position of Presidential Office secretary-general.
King said he would not be taking any position in the Presidential Office, when asked for comment in a phone interview with ETTV.
APOLOGY
Earlier yesterday, Ma apologized for the party’s poor performance in Saturday’s local government elections and promised to continue party reform and improve the overall environment.
“A large number of pan-blue supporters did not vote in the elections this year. This means we did not work hard enough and our performance had disappointed them. I want to apologize to our supporters as the party chairman,” Ma told the CSC meeting.
Ma also apologized for the behavior of the party’s candidate for Huwei Township, Yunlin County, Chen Chen-hui (陳振輝) who, inebriated and armed with a handgun, wounded the sister of his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) rival after losing the election.
The KMT took 12 of the 17 mayor and commissioner seats, while the DPP won four, and one went to an independent — a former KMT member.
The DPP increased its share of the overall vote to 45.9 percent, up from 38.2 percent four years ago, while taking back control of the hotly contested Yilan County after losing it to the KMT four years ago.
ECONOMY
Ma blamed the party’s disappointing performance on the “overall environment” and defended the Cabinet’s efforts to revive the economy and lower the unemployment rate.
“The Cabinet’s goal to establish policies in line with public expectations is correct, and we will strengthen our efforts in this direction,” he said.
Ma congratulated the DPP for its better-than-expected performance in the elections, saying he expected the two parties to resume normal relations and have a dialogue soon.
Several CSC members blamed the party’s worse-than-expected election performance on an ineffective Cabinet and called on Ma and the government to improve administrative performance.
“Apology is not the best way to solve the problem. I personally think that in order to attract public support, the government must improve administrative effectiveness,” CSC member Sean Lien (連勝文), son of former KMT chairman Lien Chan (連戰) said.
“I am very disappointed at some government officials’ slow response, and I can imagine how disappointed the public was in the government,” he said.
KMT Legislator Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順) said the party should reflect on its performance and warned that voters would give the KMT another lesson in the next election if it failed to acknowledge its mistakes.
An Emirates flight from Dubai arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport yesterday afternoon, the first service of the airline since the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran on Saturday. Flight EK366 took off from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at 3:51am yesterday and landed at 4:02pm before taxiing to the airport’s D6 gate at Terminal 2 at 4:08pm, data from the airport and FlightAware, a global flight tracking site, showed. Of the 501 passengers on the flight, 275 were Taiwanese, including 96 group tour travelers, the data showed. Tourism Administration Deputy Director-General Huang He-ting (黃荷婷) greeted Taiwanese passengers at the airport and
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