President Chen Shui-bian's (
Tuesday was the last day Chen could make a formal rebuttal to the opposition-initiated recall motion. Instead of issuing a statement to the legislature, however, Chen decided to address the nation and respond to the opposition pan-blue camp's 10 accusations.
The accusations include corruption, abuse of power, obstruction of justice, suppression of the media, incompetent governance and violating the Constitution.
The legislature yesterday began the four-day review of the recall proposal and will vote on it on Tuesday.
The motion is considered unlikely to pass given the high threshold required -- it must win two-thirds support in the legislature before a nationwide referendum can be held.
Commenting on the president's address, Lee Yeau-tarn (李酉潭), an associate professor at National Chengchi University's Sun Yat-sen Graduate Institute of Social Sciences and Humanities, said Chen had shown sincerity in answering the accusations.
"It is impossible to make everybody in the pan-blue camp happy because their only agenda is to topple the government and win elections, especially the presidential election in 2008," he said.
On a scale from zero to 100, Lee said that he rated Chen's performance a 90.
As recalling the president is a poor option in a country with a presidential and semi-presidential system, Lee said that the pan-blue camp was abusing constitutional powers to achieve its goal of seizing power.
The pan-blue camp had hoped to set a constitutional precedent by having Chen offer an official rebuttal and by questioning officials at public hearings.
Chen Yen-hui (陳延輝), a professor at the Graduate Institute of Political Science at National Taiwan Normal University, expressed a similar view.
"I watched the president's televised public address from start to finish and found it very touching, especially when he said he was willing to sacrifice himself for democracy," he said. "Only a believer in peace and democracy would make such a remark."
Chen Yen-hui said the younger generation might not understand how politics operated and what life was like during the 50 years of KMT rule, but that a 60-year-old man like him, who had lived through the authoritarian era, knew exactly what the president was talking about in his speech.
"I'm afraid if we do not march forward down the road of democracy, we will be again governed by a dictatorial regime," he said.
On a scale from zero to 100, he rated President Chen's performance a 90.
However, Chen Yen-hui said there was still much room for improvement in terms of the administration's performance, although he recognized the dilemma the government faced at the legislature.
Ger Yeong-kuang (葛永光), a professor of political science at National Taiwan University, gave President Chen's address a low mark, saying that he had failed in three areas.
First, Ger said the president failed to reach the ultimate goal of effectively convincing the public and opposition parties that the 10 accusations made to justify the recall motion did not make sense.
In terms of the content of the speech, Ger said that the president failed to offer a clear account of the corruption scandals plaguing his family and in-laws.
"It gives the public the impression that the more he tries to explain the scandals, the more it is like he is trying to straighten out the contradictions of a lie with more lies," he said.
With regard to the strategy, Ger said that the president's use of Hoklo (also known as Taiwanese) in a public address was an apparent attempt to court pan-green supporters, most of whom are Hoklo native speakers.
"While the president claimed in his speech that he is a victim of ethnic persecution, his choice of the Hoklo dialect [sic] in fact deepens ethnic divisions," he said.
On a scale from zero to 100, Ger gave Chen a grade of 50.
Taiwan is to receive the first batch of Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70 jets from the US late this month, a defense official said yesterday, after a year-long delay due to a logjam in US arms deliveries. Completing the NT$247.2 billion (US$7.69 billion) arms deal for 66 jets would make Taiwan the third nation in the world to receive factory-fresh advanced fighter jets of the same make and model, following Bahrain and Slovakia, the official said on condition of anonymity. F-16 Block 70/72 are newly manufactured F-16 jets built by Lockheed Martin to the standards of the F-16V upgrade package. Republic of China
Taiwan-Japan Travel Passes are available for use on public transit networks in the two countries, Taoyuan Metro Corp said yesterday, adding that discounts of up to 7 percent are available. Taoyuan Metro, the Taipei MRT and Japan’s Keisei Electric Railway teamed up to develop the pass. Taoyuan Metro operates the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport MRT Line, while Keisei Electric Railway offers express services between Tokyo’s Narita Airport, and the Keisei Ueno and Nippori stations in the Japanese capital, as well as between Narita and Haneda airports. The basic package comprises one one-way ticket on the Taoyuan MRT Line and one Skyliner ticket on
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it