The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday said it is a two-faced strategy of the future Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration to have someone play bad cop, who is then castigated by the premier, as when minister without portfolio-designate Chang Ching-sen (張景森) was slapped on the wrist for his remarks on Tuesday about urban renewal.
KMT caucus whip Lin Te-fu (林德福) said the “Chang controversy” was a “replay” of what happened last week with Council of Agriculture minister-designate Tsao Chi-hung (曹啟鴻), whose remarks that Taiwan does not have the leverage to stave off the import of US pork containing ractopamine residues are just a “preventive inoculation” against criticisms of the incoming DPP administration’s possible, abrupt about-face on the policy.
“Urban renewal has been halted since the Wenlin Yuan (文林苑) dispute, so Chang is trying to untie the knot for [premier-designate] Lin Chuan (林全)” to launch future urban renewal projects, Lin Te-fu said.
Photo: Lo Pei-der, Taipei Times
KMT Legislator Lai Shyh-bao (賴士葆) said this would be the future DPP administration’s “ruling mode,” in which ministers without portfolio or Cabinet members would first put out the feelers and, if met with fierce criticism, the premier would then step up to “put out the fire.”
“However, note that they will keep moving forward [in the same direction], despite the criticisms,” he added.
Chang sparked further controversy and calls for him to be replaced when he posted on Facebook on Tuesday last week a picture of a woman’s decolletage to accompany his call for people to join him for a hike up Jiuwu Peak (九 五峰) in Taipei’s Nangang District (南港).
The post with the photograph was soon deleted, as was the one in which he ridiculed activists and urban renewal victims, after being criticized by Facebook users as inappropriate.
KMT Legislator Hsu Shu-hua (許淑華) said Chang has always been a controversial figure.
Besides his remarks mocking activists, “he had also posted a photograph of a woman and made certain inappropriate and suggestive [comments], prompting an online signature drive — ‘Saying Goodbye to Ching-sen’ — calling for Chang’s replacement, which has since garnered many female posters’ support,” Hsu said.
“The Republic of China has finally elected a female president, but women’s groups have since criticized the lack of female members in the new Cabinet and a minister without portfolio-designate posting chauvinistic comments on Facebook,” KMT Legislator Lee Yan-hsiu (李彥秀) said. “It is hard for us to harbor any expectations from this future government when it comes to gender equality issues.”
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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