A week after floods and mudslides inundated dozens of villages in the south, Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) yesterday ordered government agencies to coordinate information amid criticism that rescue efforts were disorganized, slow and insufficient.
Liu said that starting yesterday, the Central Emergency Operation Center, which is in charge of disaster relief, would hold two press conferences — one in the morning and one in the afternoon — to update the public on the latest developments.
“Each government department did things in its own way when communicating with the press as they were busy helping victims,” Liu told a press conference at the center yesterday. “Now that they are coordinated, information can be obtained in one place.”
PHOTO: CHU PEI-HSIUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
Minister of Transportation and Communications Mao Chi-kuo (毛治國) took over as the commander of the center, replacing Frank Fan (范良銹), the chairman of the Public Construction Commission.
The Disaster Prevention and Protection Act (災害防救法) states that the center is to be headed by the minister of the interior.
However, with Minister of the Interior Liao Liou-yi (廖了以) traveling to the disaster-relief zone last Saturday, Fan assumed the position of commander of the center.
The premier yesterday denied that Fan was replaced by Mao in response to rising complaints about the slow pace of rescue.
“Disaster-relief has entered another stage — to help victims settle down, find jobs and go back to school, clean up the environment, maintain sanitation and prevent disease. Minister Mao is more suitable for these tasks based on his experience with the 921 Earthquake reconstruction,” Liu said.
Liu also responded to criticism of his comment on Wednesday that the government’s reaction this time was faster than after the 921 Earthquake.
The Ministry of National Defense has met with strong criticism for its slow deployment of soldiers to help people stranded by the typhoon compared with the rescue work after the 921 Earthquake. The quake hit Taiwan at 1:47am on Sept. 21, 1999, and more than 10,000 soldiers had arrived at the disaster area by early morning.
Liu said on Wednesday that comprehensive relief work following the earthquake was not launched until Sept. 28.
“The situation this time is different from [the earthquake] as heavy rainfall continued for one to two days after the typhoon, which limited rescue operations by the armed forces ... Once the weather cleared up, they acted very quickly,” Liu said. “[Thursday] was the first sunny day after the typhoon and more than 2,000 people were rescued. It was very successful.”
Liu praised the work of the military, but added that “we should also extend our sympathies to the victims. From their viewpoint, even a one-minute delay is too much. This was what I didn’t make clear [on Wednesday].”
Liu said the Cabinet would set up a reconstruction commission on Monday and pass a special statute so the government could ask for a special budget of about NT$110 billion (US$3.34 billion) on Thursday.
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:
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