Several civic groups affiliated with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday announced that they are to jointly hold a forum in Taipei, inviting KMT chairperson hopefuls to answer questions regarding the party’s future.
The forum, scheduled to take place on Saturday at 9am, is to be jointly hosted by the pro-reform Grassroots Alliance, Open KMT, Workers of the Closed Party and the Chong Shing Elites of the Kuomintang.
“Following the KMT’s unprecedented defeat in last month’s presidential and legislative elections, several groups founded by young KMT members, including the Grassroots Alliance, Open KMT, and Workers of the Closed Party, have joined forces and endeavored to inject new momentum into the party’s reform efforts,” Grassroots Alliance founder Lee Zheng-hao (李正皓) said yesterday.
Lee said that with the KMT’s chairperson by-election to take place on March 26, they decided to hold the forum titled “Chairperson, may I ask a question?” in an effort to subject candidates’ ideas and values to public scrutiny.
The forum consists of four phases: opening remarks by candidates, questions from event organizers, questions from the audience and concluding remarks by the candidates, Lee said.
“The event organizers’ questions will cover five topics: the establishment of an intraparty system for cultivating young talent, structural adjustments to the KMT’s deep-blue Huang Fu-hsing military veterans branch, possible solutions to the party’s contentious assets, the direction of cross-strait relations and the reconstruction of the KMT’s core values,” Lee said.
Lee added that 100 people are to be admitted to the forum as members of the audience, adding that those who want to attend need to register online at http://goo.gl/forms/Ndz9ywIa0K.
As of yesterday, three of the KMT’s five chairperson candidates had agreed to attend the forum, including KMT Acting Chairperson Huang Min-hui (黃敏惠), Taipei City Councilor Lee Hsin (李新) and KMT Legislator Apollo Chen (陳學聖), Lee said.
However, former deputy legislative speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) and KMT Central Standing Committee member Lin Rong-te (林榮德) have yet to respond to the groups’ invitation, Lee said.
“We will continue to extend invitations to hopefuls that have not responded,” he said.
According to the KMT’s by-election regulations, only hopefuls who collect signatures from at least 3 percent of all party members before Sunday can officially register as candidates.
Meanwhile, a source from Hung’s camp, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Hung would not attend the forum due to a schedule conflict.
“Regardless of which election she is in, Hung has never signed petitions or attended events hosted by unofficial organizations. She is inclined not to participate in Saturday’s forum and does not plan to attend other similar events in the future,” the source said.
Hung only hopes that KMT headquarters holds a formal debate among chairperson hopefuls at the earliest date possible in a just and open manner, the source added.
Hung yesterday said that she has garnered more than 16,000 signatures from party members and has therefore crossed the threshold to register her candidacy.
On Facebook, she called for volunteers to help monitor the voting process during the by-election.
Additional reporting by Shih Hsiao-kuang
Alain Robert, known as the "French Spider-Man," praised Alex Honnold as exceptionally well-prepared after the US climber completed a free solo ascent of Taipei 101 yesterday. Robert said Honnold's ascent of the 508m-tall skyscraper in just more than one-and-a-half hours without using safety ropes or equipment was a remarkable achievement. "This is my life," he said in an interview conducted in French, adding that he liked the feeling of being "on the edge of danger." The 63-year-old Frenchman climbed Taipei 101 using ropes in December 2004, taking about four hours to reach the top. On a one-to-10 scale of difficulty, Robert said Taipei 101
Nipah virus infection is to be officially listed as a category 5 notifiable infectious disease in Taiwan in March, while clinical treatment guidelines are being formulated, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. With Nipah infections being reported in other countries and considering its relatively high fatality rate, the centers on Jan. 16 announced that it would be listed as a notifiable infectious disease to bolster the nation’s systematic early warning system and increase public awareness, the CDC said. Bangladesh reported four fatal cases last year in separate districts, with three linked to raw date palm sap consumption, CDC Epidemic Intelligence
Two Taiwanese prosecutors were questioned by Chinese security personnel at their hotel during a trip to China’s Henan Province this month, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday. The officers had personal information on the prosecutors, including “when they were assigned to their posts, their work locations and job titles,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesman Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said. On top of asking about their agencies and positions, the officers also questioned the prosecutors about the Cross-Strait Joint Crime-Fighting and Judicial Mutual Assistance Agreement, a pact that serves as the framework for Taiwan-China cooperation on combating crime and providing judicial assistance, Liang
US climber Alex Honnold left Taiwan this morning a day after completing a free-solo ascent of Taipei 101, a feat that drew cheers from onlookers and gained widespread international attention. Honnold yesterday scaled the 101-story skyscraper without a rope or safety harness. The climb — the highest urban free-solo ascent ever attempted — took just more than 90 minutes and was streamed live on Netflix. It was covered by major international news outlets including CNN, the New York Times, the Guardian and the Wall Street Journal. As Honnold prepared to leave Taiwan today, he attracted a crowd when he and his wife, Sanni,
RSS