Minister of Foreign Affairs Timothy Yang (楊進添) jumped to the defense of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday after reporters questioned the propriety of Ma giving a Solomon Islands tribal chief a state-of-the-art smartphone as a gift during his visit last week to the South Pacific nation.
Chief Stanley Tapeva raised about 1,000 Solomon Islands dollars (US$120) in donations for victims of Typhoon Morakot, then spent hours in a boat and on foot traveling the 38km to the capital Honiara from his home in Kava, Isabel Province, to deliver the money.
Ma gave him the phone as a gesture of appreciation for all his hard work.
PHOTO: LO PEI-DER, TAIPEI TIMES
In a press conference detailing the government’s achievements during Ma’s state visit to the nation’s six Pacific allies, Yang showed reporters copies of English letters written by Tapeva to the press and Ma.
Yang said Tapeva was considered an intellectual in his country, and the chief knew a lot about cellphones.
Tapeva had written a letter to Taiwanese journalists saying that he had been using a cellphone for three years and that he owned three phones. Ma said Tapeva had thanked him in the letter for giving him the gift because he could use it to contact his sons, Taiwan’s technical mission and the Ministry of Agriculture, which has an office in Honiara.
Yang called the press conference after local reporters and legislators criticized the president for giving the chief a 3G HTC smartphone.
Media reports had questioned the appropriateness of the gift, suggesting it disregarded the needs of the chief and the mobile communications infrastructure of the islands.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Justin Chou (周守訓), a member of the Foreign and National Defense Committee, said the gift did not meet the needs of people of that country and that the government needed to review the decision to choose the cellphone as a gift.
However, Yang said the president “understood” the reason why the ministry chose the cellphone as a gift and considered the gift “appropriate.”
To prove that the chief knew how to use cellphones, Yang dialed one of the numbers during the press conference. Someone answered the phone, but did not identify himself and the call was cut off shortly afterwards because of bad reception.
Yang said reporters who wished to call the chief should wait until May because the Pacific nation is upgrading its international phone lines.
Ma also defended the gift of the phone yesterday.
“Even I don’t know how to use that phone,” Ma said. “It’s the latest model.”
“The Solomon Islands is not an underdeveloped country and Chief Stanley is not an uneducated man. In fact, he has had training in Australia and Kaohsiung,” Ma said. “He even told me that he felt like a minister because the cellphones I gave out were usually reserved for ministers.”
Ma said that when he was little, he went to a church in Wanhua to collect powdered milk, butter and old clothes donated by other countries. Now that Taiwan has become better off, it is time to pay back the generosity of the international community, he said.
A preclearance service to facilitate entry for people traveling to select airports in Japan would be available from Thursday next week to Feb. 25 at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport, Taoyuan International Airport Corp (TIAC) said on Tuesday. The service was first made available to Taiwanese travelers throughout the winter vacation of 2024 and during the Lunar New Year holiday. In addition to flights to the Japanese cities of Hakodate, Asahikawa, Akita, Sendai, Niigata, Okayama, Takamatsu, Kumamoto and Kagoshima, the service would be available to travelers to Kobe and Oita. The service can be accessed by passengers of 15 flight routes operated by
MORE FALL: An investigation into one of Xi’s key cronies, part of a broader ‘anti-corruption’ drive, indicates that he might have a deep distrust in the military, an expert said China’s latest military purge underscores systemic risks in its shift from collective leadership to sole rule under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), and could disrupt its chain of command and military capabilities, a national security official said yesterday. If decisionmaking within the Chinese Communist Party has become “irrational” under one-man rule, the Taiwan Strait and the regional situation must be approached with extreme caution, given unforeseen risks, they added. The anonymous official made the remarks as China’s Central Military Commission Vice Chairman Zhang Youxia (張又俠) and Joint Staff Department Chief of Staff Liu Zhenli (劉振立) were reportedly being investigated for suspected “serious
ENHANCING EFFICIENCY: The apron can accommodate 16 airplanes overnight at Taoyuan airport while work on the third runway continues, the transport minister said A new temporary overnight parking apron at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport is to start operating on Friday next week to boost operational efficiency while the third runway is being constructed, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications said yesterday. The apron — one of the crucial projects in the construction of the third runway — can accommodate 16 aircraft overnight at the nation’s largest international airport, Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) told reporters while inspecting the new facility yesterday morning. Aside from providing the airport operator with greater flexibility in aircraft parking during the third runway construction,
American climber Alex Honnold is to attempt a free climb of Taipei 101 today at 9am, with traffic closures around the skyscraper. To accommodate the climb attempt and filming, the Taipei Department of Transportation said traffic controls would be enforced around the Taipei 101 area. If weather conditions delay the climb, the restrictions would be pushed back to tomorrow. Traffic controls would be in place today from 7am to 11am around the Taipei 101 area, the department said. Songzhi Road would be fully closed in both directions between Songlian Road and Xinyi Road Sec 5, it said, adding that bidirectional traffic controls would
RSS