The Cabinet is expected to resign tomorrow, while the newly assigned premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) is scheduled to take the oath of office next Monday.
"A total of 87 Cabinet members will resign on Wednesday," Cabinet spokeswoman Chen Mei-ling (
After Chang takes oath, Chen said the new premier will reconsider or resubmit some proposals to the legislature for approval, including that on the minimum wage.
PHOTO: WANG YI-SUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
"Some proposals, such as the annual budget for the Cabinet, will be done deals and will not be changed, as most of them are pending in the legislature," Chen said. "But on issues like the minimum wage, [outgoing premier Su Tseng-chang (
As for a potential Cabinet reshuffle, Chen said she had yet to receive any information on the matter.
"The new premier was announced by the president this morning. I think even the new premier himself has yet to think about [a reshuffle] or make any decisions at this moment," Chen said. "I think new Cabinet nominees will be announced when the new premier begins work next Monday."
The new Cabinet will be comprised of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) members as it prepares for the "battle" in next year's presidential election, the DPP caucus said yesterday.
"Judging from his selection of [Presidential Secretary-General] Chiou I-jen (
"President Chen is the commander in chief of our presidential campaign," Wang said while answering inquiries about the possibility that Chen had appointed Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) to the premiership to show he "was not a lame duck."
"But I am sure that the promise he made not to focus government authority on himself remains unchanged," he said.
DPP Legislator Huang Chien-hui (
Chang could promote harmony between party factions because he is an experienced lawmaker, Huang said, adding that Chang also has the ability and experience necessary to manage an election campaign on a national scale.
"President Chen is eager to make some breakthroughs in diplomacy and on cross-strait relations during the last year of his term ... the appointment of Joseph Wu (
The identity of the new Cabinet members was also the focus of media attention yesterday.
Asked for comment at the DPP headquarters, Chang said his goal was to "put the right person in the right position," dismissing media concerns that party factions would be a determining factor in his decisions.
At a different venue, Huang dismissed media speculation that former Council of Labor Affairs chairman Lee Ying-yuan (
Meanwhile, DPP legislators were divided on the scale of the reshuffle yesterday.
DPP Legislator Cheng Yun-peng (
DPP Legislator Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇), who is also close to Hsieh, said new Cabinet officials should be chosen for their ability to contribute to government policies and the continuity of the pro-localization administration.
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (
"During a telephone conversation this morning, Chiou told me that the new Cabinet wished to negotiate with the legislature about the budget and the Organic Law of the Central Election Commission [CEC,
The standoff over the CEC bill, which would see the election body reorganized and give the pan-blue camp a majority, has resulted in the stalling of three budget requests for this fiscal year.
The three budget requests refer to the NT$1.6 trillion (US$ 47.9 billion) government budget, the NT$ 3.3 trillion budget for state-owned enterprises and government nonprofits funds and the NT$ 77.3 billion special budget for public construction projects.
"I hope the new Cabinet will set partisanship aside and handle the CEC bill rationally and impartially when it is negotiated at the legislature," Wang said.
Meanwhile, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislative caucus whip Hsu Shao-ping (
"There is only one year left. There is no doubt that Chang is the leading caretaker of the Cabinet. We hope he will improve communication with the opposition," Hsu said.
People First Party (PFP) legislative caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅崑萁) said yesterday he would continue to try to convince his party of the necessity of toppling the Chang Cabinet.
Hsu said the KMT was not considering coming out in favor of Fu's plan, adding that the party was willing to give Chang a "probation period."
Given the fact that one-third of seats in the legislature is required for a vote of no-confidence against the Cabinet to be proposed, the PFP, which controls 21 of the 217 seats, would be unable to launch the motion without the help of the KMT.
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
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
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