Government to celebrate first month in power

Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) government completes its first month in office today, with government officials and the local media busy yesterday preparing for the occasion.

Chen is scheduled to give a news conference at the Taipei Guest House this morning, where he will deliver a 25-minute speech. It will be Chen's first official news conference since he took office and the first one ever to be held outdoors by a president.

The Presidential Office has been tight-lipped on the content of Chen's speech, but it is expected that he will touch on cross-strait issues, especially the "five no's" policy he outlined in his inaugural speech on May 20, as well as the issue of "three direct links" with China.

Other likely topics include national security, foreign policy, labor and welfare policies.

Chen plans to hold regular monthly news conferences in the future.

The local Chinese-language media, meanwhile, took a look back at the government's first month in power and offered evaluations of its performance.

Premier Tang Fei's (唐飛) Cabinet has been doing better in opinion polls than the two previous Cabinets did after their first month, according to the survey conducted by the United Daily News. Tang's Cabinet received a 59 percent satisfaction rating, compared to 49 percent for Vincent Siew's (蕭萬長) cabinet and 53 percent for Lien Chan's (連戰), according to the poll.

However, the opposition New Party and KMT were much harsher in their appraisal of the Cabinet.

New Party lawmaker Lai Shyh-bao (賴士葆) praised the Cabinet for its "clean" image but criticized what he saw as its low competence.

However, Lai singled out Mainland Affairs Council chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), interior minister Chang Po-ya (張博雅) and economics minister Lin Hsin-yi (林信義) for praise, calling their performances the best in the Cabinet.

Chiang Ping-kun (江丙坤), former chief of the Council for Economic Planning and Development, said the Executive Yuan had shown a lack of administrative experience and team work. Chiang attributed the weaknesses to the fact that most of the cabinet members are career academics and elected officials.

Lin Chien-jung (林建榮), secretary-general of the KMT's legislative caucus, attributed the lack of coordination to Tang's hospitalization before the inauguration.

Chen's news conference today will also be broadcast live on the Internet at the Web site of the Government Information Office (http://www.gio.gov.tw).