Special legislation governing sports associations should be passed to guarantee transparency and players’ rights, the New Power Party (NPP) said yesterday.
“The focus of the National Sports Act (國民體育法) is mainly on schools and there are only a couple of articles related to sports associations,” NPP spokeswoman Lin Ying-mang (林穎孟) told a news conference following a meeting of the party’s Central Policy Committee. “Because of the special nature of sports associations, we feel they should be dealt with in a more detailed way.”
The party’s draft legislation, which failed to enter committee review last year, would clarify differences between sports associations and other civic groups, lower thresholds for membership, require board directors to include players and members of the public, as well as require associations to make their finances public, she said.
“Even though we have pushed for a special bill, as long as the Democratic Progressive Party [DPP]-sponsored bill truly incorporates reform and transparency, we will willingly support it,” NPP Legislator Freddy Lim (林昶佐) said.
Calls to reform the Chinese Taipei Baseball Association have mounted since the national team’s dismal performance at the World Baseball Classic last week, with some advocating the establishment of a special corporation to handle preparations for international competitions, or handing management directly to the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL).
CPBL players’ union spokesman Chao Tzu-wei (趙子維) said that differences between the for-profit CPBL and non-profit national baseball body made it difficult to imagine what cooperation would look like.
“A major blind spot in the national discussion is the differences between major competitions,” Chao said.
While the purpose of the Olympics is supposed to be international exchange, the World Baseball Classic is a “performance for profit” event, he said.
Asking the non-profit association to handle preparations for for-
profits events could lead to complications, as would asking the for-profit CPBL to handle preparations for non-profit events, he said.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
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