Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng's (王金平) recent comments targeting Mainlander Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) politicians met with concern from KMT members yesterday, with former acting chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) urging members who damage party unity to leave the party.
Wu, who is running for KMT chairman, repeated his pledge yesterday to push for cooperation between Wang and former KMT chairman Ma Ying-jeou (
"I would be an aggressive chairman and demand that Wang and Ma work together. Any member who doesn't join us in promoting party unity should leave the KMT now," Wu said yesterday during a meeting with grassroots supporters in Taichung.
Wu made the remarks in response to Wang's comments on Monday. Wang accused the KMT of designing the party's presidential primary mechanism for one particular candidate. He also raised the ethnicity issue, saying that the appropriateness of a minority ethnic group governing a majority ethnic group was questionable and would hurt the KMT in the presidential election.
"There have been discussions at home and abroad, as well as in public and in academia, about the appropriateness of the political elite of a minority ethnic group governing a majority ethnic group. The party has to think about this seriously," Wang said on Monday.
While Wang didn't elaborate, it is believed he was questioning Ma's suitability because of his Mainlander origins.
KMT Secretary-General Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) rebutted Wang's accusation, urging the speaker to specify which aspect of the primary mechanism discriminated against him.
In response to disputes between the Wang and Ma camps, KMT central standing committee members yesterday joined Wu Poh-hsiung in expressing their concern that party unity could be damaged ahead of the legislative and presidential elections.
"Wang and Ma are important assets to the KMT and the two camps should not destroy each other," KMT Legislator Shyu Jong-shyoung (
KMT Legislator Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順) complained about ongoing disputes among party heavyweights, urging the party to solve the situation before the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) attacked the KMT with the unity issue.
"While grassroots supporters are working hard to push for unity, party bigwigs are shouting at each other. The party needs to address this situation immediately," she said.
KMT spokesman Su June-pin (
Meanwhile, the KMT is discussing nominations for the year-end legislative elections and is considering giving the nomination priority to the People First Party (PFP) in seven districts, including Taipei County and Hualien County, the party said.
The year-end legislative elections will mark the first time that a "single-member constituency, two votes" electoral system is used.
The KMT and the PFP will hold public opinion polls in districts in Kaohsiung and Taichung counties and Taichung city in order to field a single pan-blue candidate, Wu Den-yih said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching