Two days before the KMT closes its five-month-long membership re-registration, the party said it was satisfied to have had more than 910,000 party faithful re-register as KMT members.
"We are happy to see that there are over 100,000 new members. But for those who are not identified with the party, we do not intend to seek them out [to re-register]," said the director of the KMT's department of organizational management, Chen Tai-i (
Compared to its previous claim to have 2.5 million members, the new figure seems to be a sign of the party's difficulty in transforming itself into a genuine democratic political party. But some top leaders disagreed.
"In a democratic society, there won't be too many people who bear strong partisan identities. However, this will be a milestone of whether the KMT will accomplish its democratization [within the party]," associate professor of politics at the Soochow University, Hsieh Chen-yu (
Another associate professor at the same university, Emile Sheng (
"I would say that if half of its members joined the party just for the sake of the party's reinforcement instead of taking advantage of some insurance coverage or other promotional benefit, the party's morale will be boosted," Sheng added.
Sheng also said he has doubts about party Chairman Lien Chan's (
"Unlike former Chairman Lee who was seen as a political strongman, Lien's political charisma does not stand out. Therefore, at a time when [the KMT] needs a great deal of dash, his role as a party leader becomes less competitive [than People First Party Chairman James Soong (
As far as political reorganization is concerned, senior member of the PFP Liu Sung-pan (
Sheng disagreed, saying that both parties were unlikely to cooperate with each other since they would be competitors in the elections. Hsieh said the KMT would develop different cooperation models with various political parties depending on the political issue concerned.
The KMT will hold its first direct election for party chairmanship on March 24.
This year all 910,000 party members will be entitled to cast their vote for the new chairman whereas, in the past, only some 2,000 party representatives had the right to vote for the chairmanship.
Japan has deployed long-range missiles in a southwestern region near China, the Japanese defense minister said yesterday, at a time when ties with Beijing are at their lowest in recent years. The missiles were installed in Kumamoto in the southern region of Kyushu, as Japan is attempting to shore up its military capacity as China steps up naval activity in the East China Sea. “Standoff defense capabilities enable us to counter the threat of enemy forces attempting to invade our country ... while ensuring the safety of our personnel,” Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. “This is an extremely important initiative for
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
MORE POPULAR: Taiwan Pass sales increased by 59 percent during the first quarter compared with the same period last year, the Tourism Administration said The Tourism Administration yesterday said that it has streamlined the Taiwan Pass, with two versions available for purchase beginning today. The tourism agency has made the pass available to international tourists since 2024, allowing them to access the high-speed rail, Taiwan Railway Corp services, four MRT systems and four Taiwan Tourist Shuttles. Previously, five types of Taiwan Pass were available, but some tourists have said that the offerings were too complicated. The agency said only two types of Taiwan Pass would be available, starting from a three-day pass with the high-speed rail and a three-day pass with Taiwan Railway Corp. The former costs NT$2,800
FIRST TRIAL: Ko’s lawyers sought reduced bail and other concessions, as did other defendants, but the bail judge denied their requests, citing the severity of the sentences Former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) was yesterday sentenced to 17 years in prison and had his civil rights suspended for six years over corruption, embezzlement and other charges. Taipei prosecutors in December last year asked the Taipei District Court for a combined 28-year, six-month sentence for the four cases against Ko, who founded the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The cases were linked to the Core Pacific City (京華城購物中心) redevelopment project and the mismanagement of political donations. Other defendants convicted on separate charges included Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Angela Ying (應曉薇), who was handed a 15-year, six-month sentence; Core Pacific
RSS