The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday amended its charter to exempt certain high-ranking government officials from serving in party positions, while amending the party’s Regulations on Clean Politics to penalize party members who fail to avoid conflicts of interest.
“The public might not know why we are holding an irregula national congress to revise our party charter,” president-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said.
“According to the DPP’s original charter, certain government officials are also required to serve as the party’s Central Standing Committee [CSC] members,” she said. “Such a rule was meaningful in the past, but we must reform it under the current situation.”
Photo: CNA
Tsai said that the DPP would look for talented people across party lines who share similar ideologies with the DPP to serve in the new government.
For instance, vice president-elect Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) and premier-designate Lin Chuan (林全) are not DPP members, Tsai said.
The revisions also show the DPP’s determination to promote neutrality of government officials, Tsai said.
Photo: CNA
“Exempting officials from having to also serve as the party’s CSC members would turn the relationship between officials and the DPP into a partnership, instead of a supervisor-to-subordinate relationship,” Tsai said. “They report to the people of Taiwan, not to the CSC, and that is why today’s [yesterday’s] party charter revisions are important.”
The original charter stipulates that party members serving as vice president, Presidential Office secretary-general and deputy secretary-general, Cabinet ministers and deputy ministers, as well as several other central government positions, must be party delegates, while DPP members serving as vice-president, premier and Presidential Office secretary-general are mandatorily CSC members under a DPP administration.
The article giving the president the option of doubling as the DPP chairperson remained unchanged.
The party charter was also amended to allow local government heads affiliated with the DPP, as well as legislative caucus officials, to serve as CSC or Central Executive Committee members, since they are elected by popular vote and represent their constituencies.
Meanwhile, the congress also amended the Regulations on Clean Politics to authorize the party’s Clean Politics Committee to penalize party members who fail to avoid conflicts of interest.
As the regulation was amended after the controversial purchase and sales of OBI Pharma Co (台灣浩鼎) shares owned by Academia Sinica president Wong Chi-huey’s (翁啟惠) daughter, the clause has been called “the Wong Chi-huey clause.”
However, Taoyuan Mayor Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦) denied that the amendment had anything to do with Wong, as he is not a DPP member.
NO-LIMITS PARTNERSHIP: ‘The bottom line’ is that if the US were to have a conflict with China or Russia it would likely open up a second front with the other, a US senator said Beijing and Moscow could cooperate in a conflict over Taiwan, the top US intelligence chief told the US Senate this week. “We see China and Russia, for the first time, exercising together in relation to Taiwan and recognizing that this is a place where China definitely wants Russia to be working with them, and we see no reason why they wouldn’t,” US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told a US Senate Committee on Armed Services hearing on Thursday. US Senator Mike Rounds asked Haines about such a potential scenario. He also asked US Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse
INSPIRING: Taiwan has been a model in the Asia-Pacific region with its democratic transition, free and fair elections and open society, the vice president-elect said Taiwan can play a leadership role in the Asia-Pacific region, vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) told a forum in Taipei yesterday, highlighting the nation’s resilience in the face of geopolitical challenges. “Not only can Taiwan help, but Taiwan can lead ... not only can Taiwan play a leadership role, but Taiwan’s leadership is important to the world,” Hsiao told the annual forum hosted by the Center for Asia-Pacific Resilience and Innovation think tank. Hsiao thanked Taiwan’s international friends for their long-term support, citing the example of US President Joe Biden last month signing into law a bill to provide aid to Taiwan,
China’s intrusive and territorial claims in the Indo-Pacific region are “illegal, coercive, aggressive and deceptive,” new US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo said on Friday, adding that he would continue working with allies and partners to keep the area free and open. Paparo made the remarks at a change-of-command ceremony at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, where he took over the command from Admiral John Aquilino. “Our world faces a complex problem set in the troubling actions of the People’s Republic of China [PRC] and its rapid buildup of forces. We must be ready to answer the PRC’s increasingly intrusive and
STATE OF THE NATION: The legislature should invite the president to deliver an address every year, the TPP said, adding that Lai should also have to answer legislators’ questions The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday proposed inviting president-elect William Lai (賴清德) to make a historic first state of the nation address at the legislature following his inauguration on May 20. Lai is expected to face many domestic and international challenges, and should clarify his intended policies with the public’s representatives, KMT caucus secretary-general Hung Meng-kai (洪孟楷) said when making the proposal at a meeting of the legislature’s Procedure Committee. The committee voted to add the item to the agenda for Friday, along with another similar proposal put forward by the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The invitation is in line with Article 15-2