Sun Yat-sen School president Chang Ya-chung (張亞中) yesterday announced that he would seek the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) nomination to run for president in 2020, saying that he would engage in talks with Beijing and explore the possibility of unification if elected.
Chang, a National Taiwan University political science professor and former diplomat, is the second KMT member to express his intention to vie for the presidential nomination after former New Taipei City mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫).
By joining the primary race, he hopes to “reset the Republic of China and the KMT” as the nation faces a series of political, economic and identity crises at home and abroad, he told a news conference at the KMT-affiliated school in Taipei.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
The KMT must “eliminate its feudal culture and tendency to ignore rules” and “reform itself into a party with ideals and clear rules, energetic and close to the public,” he said.
With new-found values, the party could reset the nation, beginning with the 2020 presidential election, he said.
Commenting on Chines President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) call on Wednesday last week for unification, Chang said that while Xi proposed “one country, two systems” as a framework for governance after unification, he is more concerned about putting an end to the hostility between the two sides, which would be “more practical and necessary.”
He said he would sign a peace treaty with Beijing on the premise of “one China, with each side having its own constitutional government” to ensure the peaceful development of both sides.
Following that, “it would be natural to explore the option of unification,” he said, adding that the two sides of the Taiwan Strait are like “brothers of one family” and “there is nothing brothers cannot talk about or cannot compromise on.”
A peace treaty would allow the government to reduce its military spending, and focus on economic development and social security, he said.
It would also pave the way for negotiating increased participation by Taiwan in international organizations and meetings, he added.
“The KMT and the Democratic Progressive Party have both been avoiding elaborating on cross-strait relations, but the problem can only be solved by confronting it,” he said.
Once an aide of Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) when she was KMT chairwoman, Chang said that he believes Hung would support him, as they “share similar beliefs.”
“Hung played the first half and I will play the second half,” he added, referring to Hung’s short-lived bid for presidency in 2015.
Hung, who advocated a “one country, same interpretation” formula, was nominated as the party’s presidential candidate in July 2015, but replaced by Chu after three months, as a majority of party members found her support for unification controversial.
Chang’s platform also includes replacing the semi-presidential system with a parliamentary system, increasing the number of legislative seats from 113 to 200, abolishing the Transitional Justice Commission, and scrapping all curriculum guidelines for history and social studies previously issued by the government in favor of allowing schools and parents to choose their own textbooks.
Taipei on Thursday held urban resilience air raid drills, with residents in one of the exercises’ three “key verification zones” reporting little to no difference compared with previous years, despite government pledges of stricter enforcement. Formerly known as the Wanan exercise, the air raid drills, which concluded yesterday, are now part of the “Urban Resilience Exercise,” which also incorporates the Minan disaster prevention and rescue exercise. In Taipei, the designated key verification zones — where the government said more stringent measures would be enforced — were Songshan (松山), Zhongshan (中山) and Zhongzheng (中正) districts. Air raid sirens sounded at 1:30pm, signaling the
The number of people who reported a same-sex spouse on their income tax increased 1.5-fold from 2020 to 2023, while the overall proportion of taxpayers reporting a spouse decreased by 4.4 percent from 2014 to 2023, Ministry of Finance data showed yesterday. The number of people reporting a spouse on their income tax trended upward from 2014 to 2019, the Department of Statistics said. However, the number decreased in 2020 and 2021, likely due to a drop in marriages during the COVID-19 pandemic and the income of some households falling below the taxable threshold, it said. The number of spousal tax filings rebounded
A saleswoman, surnamed Chen (陳), earlier this month was handed an 18-month prison term for embezzling more than 2,000 pairs of shoes while working at a department store in Tainan. The Tainan District Court convicted Chen of embezzlement in a ruling on July 7, sentencing her to prison for illegally profiting NT$7.32 million (US$248,929) at the expense of her employer. Chen was also given the opportunity to reach a financial settlement, but she declined. Chen was responsible for the sales counter of Nike shoes at Tainan’s Shinkong Mitsukoshi Zhongshan branch, where she had been employed since October 2019. She had previously worked
Labor rights groups yesterday called on the Ministry of Labor to protect migrant workers in Taiwan’s fishing industry, days after CNN reported alleged far-ranging abuses in the sector, including deaths and forced work. The ministry must enforce domestic labor protection laws on Taiwan-owned deep-sea fishing vessels, the Coalition for Human Rights for Migrant Fishers told a news conference outside the ministry in Taipei after presenting a petition to officials. CNN on Sunday reported that Taiwanese seafood giant FCF Co, the owners of the US-based Bumble Bee Foods, committed human rights abuses against migrant fishers, citing Indonesian migrant fishers. The alleged abuses included denying