Deputy Legislative Speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) yesterday dismissed speculation that some Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators might quit the party if she wins the chairmanship by-election.
“Since a party chairperson is elected with the support of a majority of party members, it means that most members agree with that person’s ideas and have decided to let that person take the party helm,” Hung said in Taipei, when asked to comment on the reports.
Hung, who has been branded a champion of rapid unification due to her “one China, same interpretation” proposal, said the only explanation is that people who differ in their ways simply cannot take counsel with each other.
Photo: Chien Jung-feng, Taipei Times
Hung made the remarks after meeting with members of a newly formed alliance called the Structure Defenders” (制度者聯盟).
Established yesterday by scores of KMT representatives and Central Committee members, the alliance has seven aims: holding a debate on the KMT’s future policy direction, revitalizing the KMT’s young forces, establishing a bottom-up policymaking mechanism, cultivating young talent, ensuring transparency of party assets, strengthening ties with people at the grassroots level, as well as lowering thresholds for party chairman election and holding a televised debate and policy presentation among candidates.
Hung said she is willing to participate in a debate on the KMT’s future direction, but it is up to each and every party member to decide to whom they aspire to entrust their party.
As for continued concerns within the KMT about her cross-strait stance, Hung said she is the one to blame because she has failed to elucidate her policies.
“I will surely explain them in the future, but not now,” she said.
KMT Legislator Apollo Chen (陳學聖), who won re-election in the Jan. 16 polls, yesterday threw his hat in the bid for party chairperson, saying his decision was prompted by three reasons.
“First, only a handful of the KMT’s middle-aged members managed to secure victory in the recent elections. As one of them, I cannot sit back and watch while the KMT faces its most difficult time,” Chen said.
The 58-year-old said he also wanted to help the KMT determine the causes of its landslide defeat and create a bottom-up democratic mechanism within the party.
Chen said he had consulted with many peers before making his decision, including former KMT chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), but declined to reveal whether Vice President Wu Den-yih (吳敦義), who is reportedly interested in vying for the position, was one of them.
Chen is the fifth KMT member to join the by-election, after Hung, former KMT vice chairman Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), as well as Taipei City councilors Lee Hsin (李新) and Chung Hsiao-ping (鍾小平).
According to KMT headquarters’ schedules for the by-election, which is planned for March 26, applicants can pick up registration forms for the election today and tomorrow.
They also have to collect signatures from at least 3 percent of all party members between today and Feb. 21 before they can officially register their candidacy on Feb. 22.
See STORIES on page 8
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
BEIJING’S ‘PAWN’: ‘We, as Chinese, should never forget our roots, history, culture,’ Want Want Holdings general manager Tsai Wang-ting said at a summit in China The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday condemned Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) for making comments at the Cross-Strait Chinese Culture Summit that it said have damaged Taiwan’s sovereignty, adding that it would investigate if the group had colluded with China in the matter and contravened cross-strait regulations. The council issued a statement after Want Want Holdings (旺旺集團有限公司) general manager Tsai Wang-ting (蔡旺庭), the third son of the group’s founder, Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), said at the summit last week that the group originated in “Chinese Taiwan,” and has developed and prospered in “the motherland.” “We, as Chinese, should never
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification