Vice President Vincent Siew (蕭萬長) yesterday morning said reconstruction in areas ravaged by Typhoon Morakot would probably take at least three years.
Siew made the remarks while meeting the new director of the American Institute in Taiwan, William Stanton, at the Presidential Office.
The legislature passed the Post-Typhoon Morakot Reconstruction Special Act (莫拉克颱風災後重建特別條例) on Aug. 27 and has approved the Cabinet’s budget request of NT$120 billion (US$3.6 billion) for the reconstruction.
PHOTO: CNA
Siew told Stanton he would visit Kaohsiung next week as his doctors are satisfied with his recovery from surgery in May.
The government will hold a national memorial service in Kaohsiung on Monday to commemorate those who died during and after Typhoon Morakot. As of yesterday, confirmed fatalities had reached 613, with another 71 listed as missing.
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), Siew and the heads of the five branches of government have been invited to the service.
Siew, 70, had two cancerous tumors removed from his lung in May and has been undergoing target therapy since the operation.
His doctor had advised him to get rest by cutting back on the number of meetings and outdoor activities he participates in.
Siew said he had been participating in outdoor activities again since late last month but would take it slowly.
Before meeting Siew yesterday, Stanton was advised by a Presidential Office staffer not to shake his hand but to use the traditional Chinese greeting of clasped hands, taking into consideration Siew’s weakened health and the risk of contracting swine flu.
Stanton hesitated when Siew reached out to shake his hand when he arrived. He then laughed and shook Siew’s hand.
Stanton offered condolences to Morakot’s victims on behalf of his government and himself and said he was glad that the US had been able to assist Taiwan, adding that this was one way to show their friendship and support.
In related news, the Taipei-based American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) called on the government to improve its management of water resources to prevent a repeat of Morakot’s deadly floods and landslides.
The trade group said in an editorial in the latest edition of its monthly publication Topics that beyond the immediate tasks of reconstruction and caring for Morakot survivors, the authorities must tackle chronic water problems.
“One of those issues is the question of how Taiwan manages its water resources to break the cycle of the constant alternation of periods of drought and flooding, and in the process to better protect vulnerable areas from soil erosion and landslides,” the editorial said.
A solution might require both an increase in government investment and higher water prices, the editorial said, adding that effective steps must be taken lest the situation worsen as global warming changes weather patterns.
The editorial said the government must take steps to regain public confidence considering the widespread disappointment over its response to Morakot.
“On an even more basic level, it is clear that the government needs to thoroughly revamp its decision-making and coordination process for responding to emergency situations,” the editorial said.
Poor administrative efficiency and inter-agency coordination are listed in AmCham’s 2009 Taiwan White Paper as one of “the executive branch’s frequent shortcomings — no matter which political party is in power” the editorial said, adding that Morakot “brought the failings into even sharper focus.”
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