Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus convener Sufin Siluko (廖國棟) yesterday urged KMT Chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) to step down over the party leadership’s controversial passage of a motion to move next year’s KMT chairperson election forward by two months.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of a legislative plenary session, Sufin said the decision at last week’s KMT Central Standing Committee meeting to exclude members on leaves of absence violated party regulations.
“As a party caucus, we play by the [legislature’s] rules on procedure on a daily basis,” Sufin said. “The KMT’s regulations do not allow the chairwoman to exclude committee members on leaves of absence as eligible participants in order to reach a quorum.”
Lauding a civil suit filed by committee member Yao Chiang-lin (姚江臨) on Monday, which seeks to invalidate the motion, as being “based on reasonable grounds,” Sufin said KMT headquarters should respect the system and adhere to regulations, because a failure to do so could result in the party falling apart.
“A party leader blatantly flaunting the law and the party’s internal regulations is enough to warrant calling for them to step down,” he said.
On Wednesday last week, Hung railroaded the motion to move up the election through the committee, despite less than half of the 40 eligible participants being in attendance, as KMT regulations stipulate that 20 is the minimum requirement for a quorum.
Hung reportedly cited regulations promulgated by the Ministry of the Interior to change the quorum requirement by excluding members on leaves of absence from the total number of members when calculating a quorum.
The motion, unveiled by KMT Central Policy Committee director Alex Tsai (蔡正元) on Dec. 19, aims to move the chairperson election from July 20 to May 20 next year to conform with the party charter and eliminate separate elections for party representatives by the Huang Fu-hsing military veterans’ branch.
Hung was elected party chairwoman on March 26 to serve the remainder of the term which started when former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was re-elected on July 20, 2013.
Ma resigned on Dec. 3, 2014, to take responsibility for the KMT’s dramatic defeat in the nine-in-one local elections in November 2014.
He was succeeded by New Taipei City Mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫) on Jan. 19 last year, who resigned nearly a year later on Jan. 16 after losing the presidential election to the Democratic Progressive Party’s candidate, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文).
Separately yesterday, former vice president Wu Den-yih (吳敦義), also of the KMT, said during a trip to Kaohsiung that as any major changes implemented by KMT headquarters could have profound and far-reaching effects on the whole party, they should be subject to thorough deliberation.
“Any proposed changes should also be subject to approval by the party’s highest decisionmaking body, the Central Standing Committee ... and cannot be decided by just one person,” Wu said.
The manner in which the motion was passed last week demonstrated that some KMT cadres have the wrong impression that major changes can be decided by a small group of people, he said.
It also showed thoughtlessness and a lack of proper prior communication, Wu said, adding that significant problems have been caused when KMT headquarters passes motions boycotted by committee members.
“The current situation is detrimental to party unity... The party chairwoman and members of the committee should begin negotiations as soon as possible, and work out a proper solution,” he said.
The International Industrial Talents Education Special (INTENSE) Program to attract foreigners to study and work in Taiwan will provide scholarships and a living allowance of up to NT$440,000 per person for two years beginning in August, Minister of Education Pan Wen-chung (潘文忠) told a meeting of the legislature’s Education and Culture Committee yesterday. Pan was giving an update on the program’s implementation, a review of universities’ efforts to recruit international students and promotion of the Taiwan Huayu Bilingual Exchanges of Selected Talent (BEST) program. Each INTENSE Program student would be awarded a scholarship of up to NT$100,000 per year for up to
BASIC OPERATIONS: About half a dozen navy ships from both countries took part in the days-long exercise based on the Code for Unplanned Encounters at Sea An unpublicized joint military exercise between Taiwan and the US in the Pacific Ocean last month was carried out in accordance with an international code, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said yesterday. According to a Reuters report citing four unnamed sources, the two nations’ navies last month conducted joint drills in the Western Pacific. The drills were not made public at the time, but “about half-a-dozen navy ships from both sides, including frigates and supply and support vessels, participated in the days-long exercises,” Reuters reported, citing the sources. The drills were designed to practice “basic” operations such as communications, refueling and resupplies,
‘MONEY PIT’: The KMT’s more than NT$2 trillion infrastructure project proposals for eastern Taiwan lack professional input and financial transparency, the DPP said The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus yesterday said it would ask the Executive Yuan to raise a motion to oppose the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus’ infrastructure proposals and prepare to file for a constitutional interpretation if the KMT-dominated legislature forces their passage. The DPP caucus described the three infrastructure plans for transportation links to eastern Taiwan proposed by the KMT as “three money pit projects” that would cost more than NT$2 trillion (US$61.72 billion). It would ask the Executive Yuan to oppose public projects that would drain state financial resources, DPP caucus secretary-general Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) said. It would also file for
SELF-SUFFICIENCY: The project would only be the beginning, as Taiwan needs at least 120 satellites to ensure uninterrupted communication, Wu Tsung-tsong said The Taiwan Space Agency (TASA) yesterday said it plans to launch six low Earth orbit satellites starting in 2026 as part of the government’s plan to boost the resilience of the nation’s communications. The development of the technology gained attention after Ukrainians were able to access the Internet through Space Exploration Technologies Corp (SpaceX) CEO Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite service, despite their infrastructure being severely damaged in the war with Russia. Two of the satellites would be built by the government, while four would involve cooperation between TASA and private contractors. “Over the past 30 years, the satellite technology in Taiwan has