Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Vice Chairman Steve Chan (詹啟賢) last night announced his decision to quit the post.
In a brief statement, he said he decided to leave the post as he has “completed the mission assigned for this phase.”
Earlier yesterday, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) dismissed a media report that Chan would quit over her disavowal of an administrative contract that he secured from Ill-gotten Party Assets Committee Chairman Wellington Koo (顧立雄), which was said to be fully authorized by Hung, but which she later refused to sign.
The Chinese-language China Times published an exclusive report yesterday saying that Chan, who is in San Francisco, told its reporter that he felt “discontented and puzzled” when Hung told the media on Sunday last week that “nobody had supported the signing of an administrative contract with the committee except Chan.”
Chan told the newspaper that he was not alone in the many meetings and negotiations with Koo, as “people from Hung’s circle” were also there.
“If those around Hung had a different opinion, they should have spoken up during the negotiations, but no, they chose to say something different from what was agreed only afterward,” Chan was quoted as saying.
Chan was reportedly not pleased about Hung’s disclosure of the internal party discussion about the negotiations, saying the handling of the controversy “was extremely unwise.”
He said that he suspected someone from the party “deliberately fed the media with what was agreed during the negotiations, for a specific purpose.”
Hung’s handling of the issue was also heavily criticized by Chan.
“If the decision not to sign [the administrative contract with the committee] was right, then those who talked [Hung] out of signing it should shoulder the responsibility and consequences it might incur, rather than passing the buck to me,” he was quoted as saying.
The China Times said Chan would likely quit as the party’s vice chairman, as he said he would “do what [he] should do.”
In Taipei yesterday, Hung said Chan is “awfully important” to her and dismissed the report, asking the media not to “maliciously drive a wedge” between her and Chan.
Local media outlets first reported in the middle of last month that the committee and Chan, representing the KMT, had agreed to sign an administrative contract that would allow the handover of the party’s shares in Central Investment Co and its subsidiary Hsinyutai to the state, even though 45 percent of the shares would have to be transferred in the form of a donation.
The contract also had provisions concerning what would be done with the funds from the disposal of Central Investment Co’s assets.
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
Taiwan has activated backup communications for its northernmost territory, the remote and strategically located island of Dongyin (東引), after poor weather conditions apparently shifted the wreckage of a ship onto an undersea cable causing it to break. The vulnerability of undersea communication cables linking Taiwan with its outlying islands has been a persistent cause of concern for Taipei, whose government has on several occasions blamed Chinese ships for intentionally causing damage. Dongyin, home to about 1,500 people, sits in a strategic position at the top of the Taiwan Strait and the island has a heavy military presence. It does not have an
RSS