While Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has announced her registration for the party’s presidential primary for next year’s election, the situation is not entirely clear in the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), where KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) and Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) are the most eye-catching duo.
Tsai registered for the DPP’s presidential primary yesterday.
Meanwhile, KMT party spokesperson Charles Chen (陳以信) said the party would make an announcement about potential candidates after discussions to be held after the Lunar New Year.
The KMT, challenged by a major setback in last year’s nine-in-one election, has remained low-profile about next year’s presidential race.
Succeeding President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) as the new party chairman, Chu has worked on party reforms, completing the tasks of restructuring the party’s Evaluation and Discipline Committee, think tank and local party offices.
Despite Chu’s promise when he ran for party chairman that he would not join next year’s race, a party official who declined to be named said the KMT could launch a bottom-up initiative encouraging Chu’s candidacy and therefore he would not rule out Chu’s running for president on the KMT ticket.
Wang, another possible KMT candidate, had dismissed speculation that he plans to announce his candidacy after the Lunar New Year.
However, most recently, he said: “[I am] not thinking about the matter at this point; maybe later,” which has since elicited extensive speculation.
Vice President Wu Den-yih’s (吳敦義) next move also has the public’s attention, but the party official said that since Wu once said that he was the vice chairman appointed by Ma the chairman — meaning that he would play only the role of Ma’s deputy — it is not likely that Wu would join the race.
The party official said that it is rare for both the main opposition party and the ruling party to launch presidential primaries before the Lunar New Year, adding that it is more that the DPP started early than that the KMT is slow.
CREDIT-GRABBER: China said its coast guard rescued the crew of a fishing vessel that caught fire, who were actually rescued by a nearby Taiwanese boat and the CGA Maritime search and rescue operations do not have borders, and China should not use a shipwreck to infringe upon Taiwanese sovereignty, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The coast guard made the statement in response to the China Coast Guard (CCG) saying it saved a Taiwanese fishing boat. The Chuan Yu No. 6 (全漁6號), a fishing vessel registered in Keelung, on Thursday caught fire and sank in waters northeast of Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台). The vessel left Keelung’s Badouzih Fishing Harbor (八斗子漁港) at 3:35pm on Sunday last week, with seven people on board — a 62-year-old Taiwanese captain surnamed Chang (張) and six
RISKY BUSINESS: The ‘incentives’ include initiatives that get suspended for no reason, creating uncertainty and resulting in considerable losses for Taiwanese, the MAC said China’s “incentives” failed to sway sentiment in Taiwan, as willingness to work in China hit a record low of 1.6 percent, a Ministry of Labor survey showed. The Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) also reported that the number of Taiwanese workers in China has nearly halved from a peak of 430,000 in 2012 to an estimated 231,000 in 2024. That marked a new low in the proportion of Taiwanese going abroad to work. The ministry’s annual survey on “Labor Life and Employment Status” includes questions respondents’ willingness to seek employment overseas. Willingness to work in China has steadily declined from
LEVERAGE: China did not ‘need to fire a shot’ to deny Taiwan airspace over Africa when it owns ‘half the continent’s debt,’ a US official said, calling it economic warfare The EU has raised concerns about overflight rights following the delay of President William Lai’s (賴清德) planned state visit to the Kingdom of Eswatini after three African nations denied overflight clearance for his charter at the last minute. Taiwanese allies Paraguay and Saint Kitts and Nevis, as well as several US lawmakers and the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) condemned China for allegedly pressuring the countries. Lai was scheduled to fly directly to Taiwan’s only African ally from yesterday to Sunday to celebrate the 40th anniversary of King Mswati III’s accession and his 58th birthday, but Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar suddenly revoked
The number of pet cats in Taiwan surpassed that of pet dogs for the first time last year, reaching 1,742,033, a 32.8 percent increase from 2023, the Ministry of Agriculture said yesterday, citing a survey. By contrast, the number of pet dogs declined slightly by 1.2 percent over the same period to 1,462,528, the ministry said. Despite the shift, households with dogs still slightly outnumber those with cats by 1.2 percent. However, while the number of households with multiple dogs has remained relatively stable, households keeping more than two cats have increased, contributing to the overall rise in the feline population. The trend
RSS