Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said on Thursday that she “respects” a move by pro-independence campaigners to establish a new political force called the Taiwan Independence Action Party.
Political commentator Chin Heng-wei (金恆煒) announced on Wednesday that he is organizing the new party along with former presidential advisers Peng Ming-min (彭明敏) and Wu Li-pei (吳澧培), as well as former Presidential Office secretary-general Chen Shih-meng (陳師孟).
While answering reporters’ questions about the new party, Tsai said that in Taiwan, a society she described as embracing democracy and freedom, it is common to hear different voices.
“Those who want to gather themselves so that their voices can sound louder and have a greater influence on society, I treat them with respect,” she said.
The Taiwan Independence Action Party is to nominate candidates to run in the legislative elections next year, which will be held simultaneously with the presidential election on Jan. 16.
Chin said the new party would support the DPP’s Tsai in the presidential election as their political ideology is similar.
The new party has more than 30 co-founders and an application to register the new political party has been sent to the Ministry of the Interior, Chin said.
He said the party is contacting legislative hopefuls as part of its plans to nominate candidates to run for legislative seats next year.
Addressing the reasons for organizing the pro-independence party, Chin said the party’s goal is to get politicians who support independence into the legislature.
He said the DPP has already stopped talking about independence and has turned its back on efforts to strive for independence for Taiwan.
“The DPP is Kuomintangized,” he said, referring to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). “Therefore, there is now no political party willing to carry the placard of Taiwan independence.”
“There must be someone standing out, talking in public about Taiwanese independence,” he said.
Chin said they chose to name the party the Taiwan Independence Action Party because Taiwan independence is not a slogan or something that can be achieved by it being written on the manifesto of a political party.
“The cause can only be achieved through action,” he said.
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