Party members who violate regulations in the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Central Standing Committee (CSC) election in September will be expelled, top party officials said yesterday after president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) handed down the directive.
KMT sources said that the party would not allow any room for mistakes in the election, scheduled for Sept. 3, concerned that any bribe-related controversy could jeopardize Ma’s run for re-election.
The CSC, whose members are elected every year by central committee members, is the party’s highest decision-making body and its 32 members meet every Wednesday to approve major policies.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
However, the committee’s role has been weakened since Ma was elected party chairman in 2005 and began meeting with party officials to discuss major decisions at a separate weekly meeting.
The CSC election in 2009 was plagued by accusations of vote-buying and bribery and Ma, who had regained the chair following a 19-month hiatus from 2005 to 2007, ordered a re--election despite objections from some party members and that it was against party regulations.
Party officials said that Ma instructed CSC members at Wednesday’s meeting to observe the rules during the upcoming election and warned against bribery, saying that any such action would create a negative impression of the party and result in dismissals.
Officials quoted Ma as saying that recent disputes surrounding the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) legislator-at-large list were a perfect example of how an inter-party controversy could negatively impact the image of a political party.
KMT sources said it was expected that election rules would be strictly enforced to prevent any unfavorable impact on Ma’s re-election campaign.
Saying that “no one wants to be treated like a thief,” a potential CSC member, who wished to remain anonymous, said that few members had shown any interest in taking part in the September election, adding that participation could be the lowest ever for a CSC election.
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Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
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