Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Acting chairperson Huang Min-hui (黃敏惠) yesterday said the party would continue to reflect upon its defeats and solicit opinions from all sides, after the party’s recent report reviewing its disastrous electoral performance drew criticism.
“The KMT once suffered a severe setback in the past and now it has sustained new blows. We must translate talk of reform into action,” Huang said in response to media queries on the sidelines of a memorial service for shipping giant Evergreen Group founder Chang Yung-fa (張榮發) in Taipei yesterday morning.
Huang said she was aware of negative comments on the KMT’s report on its performance in the Jan. 16 elections, released on Wednesday, which has been described as being riddled with cliches and opinions from “people sitting in the office,” rather than actual candidates competing in the races.
Photo: Lo Pei-der, Taipei Times
“I promise I will continue to engage in self-reflection and to discuss the issue with supporters and grassroots party members. I will work to gather relevant information relentlessly, step-by-step,” Huang said.
The report attributed the KMT’s unprecedented losses in the elections to five major reasons: the failure of the KMT administration to win the public’s trust; the party’s inability to assuage critics painting its cross-strait policies as leaning toward China; divisions among KMT members in the party’s selection of presidential candidates last year, the party’s failure to win over netizens; and its unpopularity among younger voters.
It also blamed the incident involving Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), a Taiwanese K-pop singer allegedly forced by her South Korean management to apologize on Jan. 15 for briefly holding a Republic of China flag during a TV show, as the last straw.
Huang said the KMT must reflect on its bitter defeats and make improvements in areas where the party has not done enough.
“If we do not push for reforms today, we will be the ones being reformed tomorrow,” said Huang, who is vying for KMT chairpersonship against five other hopefuls, including former deputy legislative speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱).
A two-term Chiayi City mayor, Huang applied for a leave of absence from her role as acting party chairperson after she announced her bid on Wednesday last week.
Huang and Hung are deemed the two most likely candidates to secure the chairpersonship, which was left vacant by New Taipei City Mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫), who resigned on Jan. 16 to take responsibility for the party’s landslide defeat in the elections.
The KMT’s chairperson by-election is scheduled for March 26. Only those who manage to collect signatures from at least 3 percent of all party members before Feb. 21 can officially register their candidacy.
AGING: While Japan has 22 submarines, Taiwan only operates four, two of which were commissioned by the US in 1945 and 1946, and transferred to Taiwan in 1973 Taiwan would need at least 12 submarines to reach modern fleet capabilities, CSBC Corp, Taiwan chairman Chen Cheng-hung (陳政宏) said in an interview broadcast on Friday, citing a US assessment. CSBC is testing the nation’s first indigenous defense submarine, the Hai Kun (海鯤, Narwhal), which is scheduled to be delivered to the navy next month or in July. The Hai Kun has completed torpedo-firing tests and is scheduled to undergo overnight sea trials, Chen said on an SET TV military affairs program. Taiwan would require at least 12 submarines to establish a modern submarine force after assessing the nation’s operational environment and defense
A white king snake that frightened passengers and caused a stir on a Taipei MRT train on Friday evening has been claimed by its owner, who would be fined, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. A person on Threads posted that he thought he was lucky to find an empty row of seats on Friday after boarding a train on the Bannan (Blue) Line, only to spot a white snake with black stripes after sitting down. Startled, he jumped up, he wrote, describing the encounter as “terrifying.” “Taipei’s rat control plan: Release snakes on the metro,” one person wrote in reply, referring
The coast guard today said that it had disrupted "illegal" operations by a Chinese research ship in waters close to the nation and driven it away, part of what Taipei sees a provocative pattern of China's stepped up maritime activities. The coast guard said that it on Thursday last week detected the Chinese ship Tongji (同濟號), which was commissioned only last year, 29 nautical miles (54km) southeast of the southern tip of Taiwan, although just outside restricted waters. The ship was observed lowering ropes into the water, suspected to be the deployment of scientific instruments for "illegal" survey operations, and the coast
Taiwan’s two cases of hantavirus so far this year are on par with previous years’ case numbers, and the government is coordinating rat extermination work, so there should not be any outbreaks, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said today in an interview with the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper). An increase in rat sightings in Taipei and New Taipei City has raised concerns about the spread of hantavirus, as rats can carry the disease. In January, a man in his 70s who lived in Taipei’s Daan District (大安) tested positive posthumously for hantavirus, Taiwan’s
RSS