The legislature yesterday approved the appointments of all seven Fair Trade Commission members and National Communications Commission (NCC) member Chiang Yu-feng (江幽芬), but withheld the review of Wang Yung-ho (汪用和) until the next legislative session next month.
Although the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus voted against the nominees and the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) caucus abstained from voting, the candidates passed the review with the support of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers.
FTC Chairman Wu Shiow-ming (吳秀明) and Vice Chairman Sun Lih-chyun (孫立群), along with the other five candidates, all passed the minimum required number of votes — ie, 54, or more than half of the 106 lawmakers presents — and were approved as members of the independent commission.
Photo: CNA
The lawmakers voted 63 to 41 in favor of Chiang’s nomination with two invalid votes, but decided to postpone the review of Wang’s candidacy until the new session.
According to the National Communications Commission Organization Act (通傳會組織法), seven commissioners are to serve a four-year term after being nominated by the premier and approved by the legislature.
Wang and Chiang were nominated by the Executive Yuan last month to fill the vacancies created by the resignation of Chang Shi-chung (張時中) and Chen Yuan-ling (陳元玲).
However, Wang’s review last week was suspended after DPP Legislator Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲) raised the question of a potential conflict of interest because of her family’s business links to China.
Kuan said Wang’s uncle, Wang Chao-yong (汪潮涌), owns a Beijing-based investment firm called ChinaEquity Group and is also an investor in a firm owned by Wang’s father, Wang Da-hua (汪大華), that invests in value-added telecoms services.
Wang Yung-ho, the wife of former KMT lawmaker Justin Chou (周守訓), subsequently issued a press release accusing Kuan of mud-slinging, rebutting Kuan’s allegations that her father owns a Chinese-invested firm and saying her uncle’s investment in China does not operate in sectors that falls under the NCC’s purview.
She added that Wang Chao-yong is not a blood relation and that she calls him uncle out of respect for his age.
The accusations made by the DPP that she might sell out Taiwanese interests constitute “character assassination,” she said.
“The DPP has blown everything out of proportion. Is every lawmaker who has friends investing in China likely to sell out the national interests?” Wang Yung-ho asked.
Cabinet Deputy Secretary-General Steven Chen (陳士魁) told reporters yesterday that the Executive Yuan continues to support Wang’s nomination and it was unfair to use her uncle’s business in China against her because “it is not illegal according to current regulations.”
Kuan blasted the Executive Yuan at a press conference for refusing to replace Wang with a new nominee and said Wang had lied in her press release.
Wang Chao-yung’s ChinaEquity Group has invested in telecommunications services and new media ventures, and the company owned by Wang’s father is registered with the Ministry of Economic Affairs as a “Chinese-invested company,” with 60 percent owned by Wang Chao-yung, Kuan said.
Premier Sean Chen needs to explain why the Executive Yuan insists on nominating Wang Yung-ho, Kuan said.
As for Wang Yung-ho’s contention that Internet service providers (ISP) — one of Wang Chao-yung’s business investment targets — do not fall under the NCC’s purview, DPP Legislator Yeh Yi-jin (葉宜津) said that ISPs and Internet content providers are both regulated by the NCC.
“Wang’s [Yung-ho] argument shows that she is not qualified to serve on the NCC board because she does not even know what the commission does,” Yeh said.
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
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods