Amid a dramatic increase in the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) membership, members of the Junior Chamber International Taiwan were admitted to the party yesterday.
Twenty-four members of the chamber, including chamber president Andy Ho (侯宗延) and former president Hsu Yu-ming (許又銘), received party membership certificates in a ceremony chaired by President and DPP chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文).
Many of the applicants were said to be interested in seeking nomination as the party’s candidates in the mayoral and councilor elections next year.
Their admittance shows the importance the party attaches to young people, DPP spokesman Yang Chia-liang (楊家俍) said, rejecting speculation that the ceremony was held in response to a decline in the party’s popularity among young people in recent polls.
The chamber does not have any particular political orientation, with former vice president Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and DPP legislators Tsai Chi-chang (蔡其昌) and Hung Chun-yi (洪宗熠) being former members, Hsu said.
It was the first time that chamber members collectively sought the membership of a political party, Hsu added.
Ho said they are willing to assist the DPP with reforming the nation and reaching out to international communities through the chamber’s connection with Southeastern Asia.
To facilitate the DPP administration’s “new southbound policy,” chamber members would invite young leaders from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore to Taiwan to exchange views with Taiwanese.
“In terms of social and economic issues, we are willing to be the ‘seed’ to explain [the DPP’s policies] to young people in language that they can understand,” Ho said.
The 24 chamber members were introduced to the DPP by party secretary-general Hung Yao-fu (洪耀福) in November last year.
Chamber members must be aged from 18 to 40. The youngest member admitted to the DPP yesterday was 28.
Since the DPP government took office in May, applications for DPP membership had surged nearly 14 times to 50,000 as of the end of last year.
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