Following Kaohsiung City Government’s recent refusal of a Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) request to promote an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China, a number of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)-administered local governments have followed suit and say they will reject requests for help from the CLA to promote the proposed cross-strait trade pact.
In a written statement issued yesterday, Yilan County Commissioner Lin Tsung-hsien (林聰賢) said the county government’s Department of Labor Affairs would not help the CLA promote an ECFA.
“As a government agency in charge of serving all workers, the Department of Labor Affairs is currently fully occupied with what it is supposed to be doing according to the law — and that does not include promoting an ECFA,” Lin’s statement said.
He added that, since President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) has said that signing an ECFA would not have an impact on the labor market in Taiwan, “certainly the county government is not required to help promote it.”
Both Tainan Mayor Hsu Tai-tsai (?]) and Tainan County Commissioner Su Huan-chih (蘇煥智) have also said they would refuse to cooperate with the CLA. DPP commissioners in Chiayi, Yunlin, Kaohsiung and Pingtung counties also expressed concern over the trade pact, although they have not yet said whether they will follow in Kaohsiung City’s footsteps.
In response to Kaohsiung City Government’s Labor Bureau Director Chung Kung-chao’s (鍾孔炤) comments on Tuesday that his bureau had decided not to comply with the CLA’s request to promote an ECFA at the city’s employment services centers because the public remained widely divided on the issue, the CLA issued a press release at 1am on Wednesday expressing its regret over the issue.
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊) yesterday denied the city government was “defying” a CLA directive, stressing the city government should enjoy equal footing with the central government.
“The central government and local governments should be partners,” Chen told reporters in Kaohsiung. “Whenever there is a difference of opinion, the central government should communicate with local governments instead of forcing local governments to comply [with the central government requests.]”
While CLA Vice Minister Pan Shih-wei (潘世偉) said local governments could not refuse to cooperate on the grounds that employment centers were meant to help workers solve employment-related problems, Chen said it was more important for the central government to allow the centers to help workers cope with other challenges and unemployment rather than to oblige them to promote an ECFA.
“Up to 60 percent or 70 percent of people still do not understand the content of an ECFA, so the issue remains debatable. We cannot simply say nice things about it,” Chen said.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Yang Li-huan (楊麗環) yesterday urged CLA Minister Jennifer Wang (王如玄) not to give in.
DPP Legislator Huang Sue-ying (黃淑英), on the other hand, stood behind the Kaohsiung City Government’s position and said: “It’s extremely improper to make the authorities that are meant to help with unemployment require members of the public to [understand] an ECFA before they hand out subsidies.”
DPP Legislator Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲) said: “Kaohsiung City Government is an autonomous local government. Of course it has the right to refuse to cooperate on marketing an ECFA, I don’t see a problem with that.”
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY VINCENT Y. CHAO AND STAFF WRITER
Also See: Government takes ECFA marketing blitz to trains
Also See: CLA unable to answer ECFA questions
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
TRADE: A mandatory declaration of origin for manufactured goods bound for the US is to take effect on May 7 to block China from exploiting Taiwan’s trade channels All products manufactured in Taiwan and exported to the US must include a signed declaration of origin starting on May 7, the Bureau of Foreign Trade announced yesterday. US President Donald Trump on April 2 imposed a 32 percent tariff on imports from Taiwan, but one week later announced a 90-day pause on its implementation. However, a universal 10 percent tariff was immediately applied to most imports from around the world. On April 12, the Trump administration further exempted computers, smartphones and semiconductors from the new tariffs. In response, President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration has introduced a series of countermeasures to support affected
CROSS-STRAIT: The vast majority of Taiwanese support maintaining the ‘status quo,’ while concern is rising about Beijing’s influence operations More than eight out of 10 Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework for cross-strait relations, according to a survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday. The MAC’s latest quarterly survey found that 84.4 percent of respondents opposed Beijing’s “one country, two systems” formula for handling cross-strait relations — a figure consistent with past polling. Over the past three years, opposition to the framework has remained high, ranging from a low of 83.6 percent in April 2023 to a peak of 89.6 percent in April last year. In the most recent poll, 82.5 percent also rejected China’s
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
RSS