As his Cabinet yesterday resigned en masse, outgoing Premier William Lai (賴清德) said that he had no regrets about his time in office and hoped he would meet all his team members again “on the road to making Taiwan great.”
Lai called an extraordinary Cabinet meeting, during which he and Cabinet members affixed their official seals to a joint resignation addressed to President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文).
After shaking hands with each Cabinet member at a ceremony, Lai gave a farewell speech.
Photo: CNA, provided by the Executive Yuan
After he took office, Lai encouraged his Cabinet to be pragmatic, he said, citing countless policy meetings and a tour of the nation’s 22 cities and counties to take stock of their progress on the Long-term Care Services Program 2.0 and the Forward-looking Infrastructure Development Program, and assess their development needs.
It was a period of joyous moments and tragedies — such as a Puyuma Express train derailment in October last year and flooding in central and southern Taiwan in August last year — but Lai said that had no regrets or complaints about the time he spent “developing the nation, boosting the economy, serving the people and nourishing Taiwan.”
After the Democratic Progressive Party suffered crushing defeats in the Nov. 24 local elections, public frustration with the government could not be assuaged by Tsai’s resignation as party chairperson, so as the premier, he had to take responsibility, Lai said.
He told the public that he would resign at the appropriate time and with the general budget on Thursday clearing the Legislative Yuan “the time has come,” he said.
At a legislative question-and-answer session in November last year about the government’s handling of the Puyuma Express accident, he was reminded of the three terms he served as a lawmaker, Lai said, adding that the period bolstered his belief that accountable governance is the bedrock of democracy and taking responsibility is the highest expression of that accountability.
Only by resigning could he help Tsai overcome old obstacles and perform better, opening up new frontiers, Lai said.
“Here is where we met and it is where we will part. If fate so decides, we will meet again on the road to making Taiwan great,” he said.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
‘SPEY’ REACTION: Beijing said its Eastern Theater Command ‘organized troops to monitor and guard the entire process’ of a Taiwan Strait transit China sent 74 warplanes toward Taiwan between late Thursday and early yesterday, 61 of which crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait. It was not clear why so many planes were scrambled, said the Ministry of National Defense, which tabulated the flights. The aircraft were sent in two separate tranches, the ministry said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday “confirmed and welcomed” a transit by the British Royal Navy’s HMS Spey, a River-class offshore patrol vessel, through the Taiwan Strait a day earlier. The ship’s transit “once again [reaffirmed the Strait’s] status as international waters,” the foreign ministry said. “Such transits by
RSS