Taichung City's proposed Guggen-heim Museum branch became the focus of the legislature's extra session yesterday as legislators and Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) expressed concern over the fate of the project, but Premier Yu Shyi-kun said the pan-blue camp had obstructed the entire process in the first place.
Guggenheim is one of the projects provisionally included in the Executive Yuan's NT$500 billion 10 key infrastructure projects package, but the Cabinet has only prepared NT$36.5 billion for two ongoing projects: the "third-generation highway" and MRT systems in northern, central and southern Taiwan.
"Premier Yu promised me that he will work hard to allow the special budget for the museum to be prepared for next year, and that it will be sent to the legislature for review together with the annual budget for next year," Wang said. "The premier also said that the government was willing to help the museum with capital flow until the end of this year."
Wang said that after the Executive Yuan submitted the budget plan to the legislature, he suggested to Yu that it make an amendment to include the budget for the Guggenheim.
He said that after the amendment was sent to the legislature, the amendment could be passed and the budget granted.
"But Premier Yu said to me that it was difficult to push the amendment through, that there was no rush now and that the Executive Yuan could wait a bit longer before it prepares the special budget for the museum next year," Wang said.
He also said Yu promised that if the museum needed funding for planning and other preparatory work, the government would be willing to help it.
Two days ago legislators from Taichung City also questioned Yu over why the Executive Yuan failed to prepare the budget for the museum this year.
high threshold
Yu blamed the situation on the pan-blue camp for setting a high threshold in the Special Statute for Increasing Investment in Public Construction (
Yu also said that the Taichung City Government had failed to complete a report on an alternative plan before a deadline this year.
Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (
"The central government has failed to deliver on its promise and keeps on using different excuses," Hu said. "An alternative? What do we replace the Guggenheim Museum with? The British Museum?"
NO QUORUM
In related news, the extra legislative session continued yesterday with amendments to the controversial Farmers' Association Law (
The amendments, proposed by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus, aim to loosen up restrictions on convicted criminals taking up posts in the associations.
KMT Legislator Hsu Shu-po (
Most of the absent committee members were DPP legislators.
"The DPP caucus agreed to discuss the bills in the extra session during inter-party negotiations, and the bills that were to be discussed in the session were also agreed on," Hsu said.
"The committee did not have to pass the bill, but at the least we had to discuss them," Hsu said. "The DPP caucus cannot be selective about the bills they want to discuss or pass up on."
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
BREACH OF CONTRACT: The bus operators would seek compensation and have demanded that the manufacturer replace the chips with ones that meet regulations Two bus operators found to be using buses with China-made chips are to demand that the original manufacturers replace the systems and provide compensation for breach of contract, the Veterans Affairs Council said yesterday. Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) yesterday said that Da Nan Bus Co and Shin-Shin Bus Co Ltd have fielded a total of 82 buses that are using Chinese chips. The bus models were made by Tron-E, while the systems provider was CYE Electronics, Lin said. Lin alleged that the buses were using chips manufactured by Huawei subsidiary HiSilicon Co, which presents a national security risk if the
RSS