Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) settled a minor Cabinet reshuffle yesterday, bringing Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源), an aide to People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜), and Cyrus Chu (朱敬一), an academic known for his outspoken criticism of the government’s economic policies, into the Cabinet, as well as a replacement for outgoing Department of Health Minister Yaung Chih-liang (楊志良).
Lee, a professor of civil engineering at National Taiwan University, gained prominence in 1987 after he was brought in by Soong, then-Taiwan provincial governor, to handle flood prevention and water resources management.
His love life overtook his political career in 2009, when an extramarital affair with Non-Partisan Solidarity Union Legislator May Chin (高金素梅) led him to offer his resignation as deputy commissioner of Taipei County. During his time with the Taipei County government, Lee was often present when President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) inspected hydraulic engineering projects.
Lee will replace Minister of the Public Construction Commission (PCC) Fan Liang-shiow (范良銹) and double as a minister without portfolio in the Cabinet office, Wu said.
Speaking by telephone, Lee said his priorities included river management, disaster prevention and land-use planning, as the PCC will be partly responsible for development after the government’s reconstruction plan is implemented next year.
Fan, 65, told reporters he was asked to see Wu a few days ago after he expressed his wish to end his 40 years of public service to spend more time with his family and hand over his responsibilities to a younger generation.
While Wu has asked Chu, an academician at Academia Sinica since 1998, to join the Cabinet, Chu has been traveling abroad and had yet to give final consent. He was scheduled to return home last night, Wu said.
Wu would not confirm whether Chu would replace Chang Chin-fu (張進福), minister without portfolio responsible for coordinating technology-related policies and executing the six flagship industries. Chang was appointed by former premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) to create momentum for development in the biotechnology, sophisticated energy, medical care, tourism and innovative culture sectors.
Chu, who has a doctorate in economics from the University of Michigan, recently resigned as chairman of the government-affiliated Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research, a position he had held since July 2008.
Chu has often been consulted by Ma on economic issues and has published several newspaper articles critical of the government’s economic policies.
Meanwhile, Wu said Lee Yun-jie (李允傑), a professor of public administration at National Open University, would replace Wang Yu-ting (王昱婷) as National Youth Commission minister, while Luo Ying-shay (羅瑩雪), an attorney and consultant to Ma, would succeed Kao Su-po (高思博) as Mongolian and Tibetan Affairs minister.
Wang and Kao recently offered to resign amid accusations that some Cabinet members had refused to run in a legislative by-election.
Taipei Medical University president Chiu Wen-ta (邱文達) has been tapped to succeed Yaung as Department of Health minister, the premier said.
Although there has been speculation that Mainland Affairs Council Minister Lai Shin-yuan (賴幸媛) would be replaced, Wu praised her performance and said she would remain in the Cabinet.
The handover ceremony for the new ministers will be held next Wednesday, Wu said.
Minister Without Portfolio Yiin Chii-ming (尹啟銘) told the Taipei Times by telephone last night that he also wanted to step down because he was tired of the job. At press time, Wu’s office had yet to confirm whether it would accept the resignation
NO RECIPROCITY: Taipei has called for cross-strait group travel to resume fully, but Beijing is only allowing people from its Fujian Province to travel to Matsu, the MAC said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday criticized an announcement by the Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism that it would lift a travel ban to Taiwan only for residents of China’s Fujian Province, saying that the policy does not meet the principles of reciprocity and openness. Chinese Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism Rao Quan (饒權) yesterday morning told a delegation of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers in a meeting in Beijing that the ministry would first allow Fujian residents to visit Lienchiang County (Matsu), adding that they would be able to travel to Taiwan proper directly once express ferry
FAST RELEASE: The council lauded the developer for completing model testing in only four days and releasing a commercial version for use by academia and industry The National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) yesterday released the latest artificial intelligence (AI) language model in traditional Chinese embedded with Taiwanese cultural values. The council launched the Trustworthy AI Dialogue Engine (TAIDE) program in April last year to develop and train traditional Chinese-language models based on LLaMA, the open-source AI language model released by Meta. The program aims to tackle the information bias that is often present in international large-scale language models and take Taiwanese culture and values into consideration, it said. Llama 3-TAIDE-LX-8B-Chat-Alpha1, released yesterday, is the latest large language model in traditional Chinese. It was trained based on Meta’s Llama-3-8B
STUMPED: KMT and TPP lawmakers approved a resolution to suspend the rate hike, which the government said was unavoidable in view of rising global energy costs The Ministry of Economic Affairs yesterday said it has a mandate to raise electricity prices as planned after the legislature passed a non-binding resolution along partisan lines to freeze rates. Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers proposed the resolution to suspend the price hike, which passed by a 59-50 vote. The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) voted with the KMT. Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) of the KMT said the resolution is a mandate for the “immediate suspension of electricity price hikes” and for the Executive Yuan to review its energy policy and propose supplementary measures. A government-organized electricity price evaluation board in March
NOVEL METHODS: The PLA has adopted new approaches and recently conducted three combat readiness drills at night which included aircraft and ships, an official said Taiwan is monitoring China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) exercises for changes in their size or pattern as the nation prepares for president-elect William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration on May 20, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said yesterday. Tsai made the comment at a meeting of the Legislative Yuan’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, in response to Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu’s (王定宇) questions. China continues to employ a carrot-and-stick approach, in which it applies pressure with “gray zone” tactics, while attempting to entice Taiwanese with perks, Tsai said. These actions aim to help Beijing look like it has