Miaoli County Commissioner Liu Cheng-hung (劉政鴻) was on Wednesday night nominated as a member of the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Central Committee, despite the recent public outcry over the forced demolition of four houses in Miaoli County’s Dapu Borough (大埔).
On President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) nomination list, Liu was ranked 32th out of 210 nominees.
Keelung Mayor Chang Tung-rong (張通榮), who has low approval ratings, ranked 34th.
Photo: CNA
Liu ranked 77th in the previous nomination list presented by former KMT chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄).
The top five nominees included KMT legislators Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順) and Yuang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔), and KMT Central Standing Committee members Lee Chuan-chiao (李全教), Hung Yu-chin (洪玉欽) and Hsu Hsian-rong (許顯榮).
The nomination list sparked criticism from the opposition camp, with Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus convener Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) saying that Ma’s list will generate public dissent against the KMT, and his nomination of Liu as a Central Committee member reflected his ignorance of public opinion.
The KMT yesterday declined to comment on Ma’s nomination of Liu as a Central Committee member amid continuous protests against Liu and the county government.
A KMT official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, rebutted Ker’s criticism by insisting that the party’s nomination list did not guarantee that all nominees will be elected, as party delegates also have the right to nominate Central Committee members via petitions.
The official acknowledged that Ma’s nomination should guarantee election, but added that party members aiming for the Central Committee can still qualify to enter the race by obtaining signatures from at least six party delegates.
Former Taipei EasyCard Corp chairman Sean Lien (連勝文), son of former KMT chairman Lien Chan (連戰), and KMT Central Standing Committee member Hsieh Kung-hung (謝坤宏), who failed in his attempt to compete with Ma in the KMT chairmanship election earlier this month, are also on the nomination list.
The KMT will elect 210 Central Committee members on Aug. 17, while party delegates will elect 32 Central Standing Committee members from those Central Committee members on Sept. 7.
AGING: As of last month, people aged 65 or older accounted for 20.06 percent of the total population and the number of couples who got married fell by 18,685 from 2024 Taiwan has surpassed South Korea as the country least willing to have children, with an annual crude birthrate of 4.62 per 1,000 people, Ministry of the Interior data showed yesterday. The nation was previously ranked the second-lowest country in terms of total fertility rate, or the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime. However, South Korea’s fertility rate began to recover from 2023, with total fertility rate rising from 0.72 and estimated to reach 0.82 to 0.85 by last year, and the crude birthrate projected at 6.7 per 1,000 people. Japan’s crude birthrate was projected to fall below six,
Conflict with Taiwan could leave China with “massive economic disruption, catastrophic military losses, significant social unrest, and devastating sanctions,” a US think tank said in a report released on Monday. The German Marshall Fund released a report titled If China Attacks Taiwan: The Consequences for China of “Minor Conflict” and “Major War” Scenarios. The report details the “massive” economic, military, social and international costs to China in the event of a minor conflict or major war with Taiwan, estimating that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) could sustain losses of more than half of its active-duty ground forces, including 100,000 troops. Understanding Chinese
US President Donald Trump in an interview with the New York Times published on Thursday said that “it’s up to” Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be “very unhappy” with a change in the “status quo.” “He [Xi] considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing, but I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that. I hope he doesn’t do that,” Trump said. Trump made the comments in the context
SELF-DEFENSE: Tokyo has accelerated its spending goal and its defense minister said the nation needs to discuss whether it should develop nuclear-powered submarines China is ramping up objections to what it sees as Japan’s desire to acquire nuclear weapons, despite Tokyo’s longstanding renunciation of such arms, deepening another fissure in the two neighbors’ increasingly tense ties. In what appears to be a concerted effort, China’s foreign and defense ministries issued statements on Thursday condemning alleged remilitarism efforts by Tokyo. The remarks came as two of the country’s top think tanks jointly issued a 29-page report framing actions by “right-wing forces” in Japan as posing a “serious threat” to world peace. While that report did not define “right-wing forces,” the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was
RSS