Premier Lin Chuan (林全) yesterday confirmed that 35-year-old Audrey Tang (唐鳳), a tech prodigy and former adviser to BenQ and Apple, is to join the Cabinet in October as a minister without portfolio.
Cabinet spokesman Tung Chen-yuan (童振源) first broke the news yesterday morning, which Lin confirmed in the afternoon, when he was asked about the appointment by reporters on the sidelines of the 2016 Taiwan Sustainability Summit in Taipei.
Lin said Tang’s achievements in the digital industry and open government projects have been recognized worldwide.
“Our hope is that by inviting her to join the Executive Yuan team, she could contribute in the said fields. Her role as a minister without portfolio will be different from the others: Instead of participating in drawing up bills, she is expected to assist government agencies in building communication platforms for all kinds of public policies and putting government information to good use,” Lin said.
Tang has been called an Internet prodigy who taught herself computer programming when she was eight.
At 16, she launched a start-up computer company and “retired” at 34. Since then she has been an active member of the open source community and a major contributor to g0v.tw (零時政府), which seeks to improve transparency in government and dissemination of public information, and vTaiwan, a platform for the government to solicit and integrate public opinion and promote communication.
Tang, who is currently abroad, confirmed the appointment on her Facebook page.
She said that from 2014 to last year, she served as an adviser to the Executive Yuan’s plans in making virtual-world regulations, and is a committee member of the National Development Council’s open data advisory committee and of the 12-year education course development committee.
“I have also been collaborating with the French ministries of foreign affairs and economy, Paris’ city government and Madrid’s city government on digital governance,” Tang said on Facebook.
She said that after becoming a member of the Cabinet, she expects to be “a civil servant of civil servants, that is, through the use of digital technologies and systems, to assist the government in solving problems and to enhance communication and cooperation between government agencies and civil technology and community,” she said.
“My presence [in the government] will not be for certain communities to have easy access to the administration, nor will it be for ‘policy announcements’ on the Internet. Rather, it will be a ‘channel’ for the better combination of wisdom and power,” she added.
Tang’s appointment will not only significantly lower the average age of the Cabinet, which has been criticized for being too old, but also mark a milestone for gender equality. Tang was born male and did not change her gender and name until 2005.
ANOTHER EMERGES: The CWA yesterday said this year’s fourth storm of the typhoon season had formed in the South China Sea, but was not expected to affect Taiwan Tropical Storm Gaemi has intensified slightly as it heads toward Taiwan, where it is expected to affect the country in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 8am yesterday, the 120km-radius storm was 800km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost tip, moving at 9kph northwest, the agency said. A sea warning for Gaemi could be issued tonight at the earliest, it said, adding that the storm is projected to be closest to Taiwan on Wednesday or Thursday. Gaemi’s potential effect on Taiwan remains unclear, as that would depend on its direction, radius and intensity, forecasters said. Former Weather Forecast
As COVID-19 cases in Japan have been increasing for 10 consecutive weeks, people should get vaccinated before visiting the nation, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said. The centers reported 773 hospitalizations and 124 deaths related to COVID-19 in Taiwan last week. CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Director Guo Hung-wei (郭宏偉) on Tuesday said the number of weekly COVID-19 cases reported in Japan has been increasing since mid-May and surpassed 55,000 cases from July 8 to July 14. The average number of COVID-19 patients at Japan’s healthcare facilities that week was also 1.39 times that of the week before and KP.3 is the dominant
The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) working group for Taiwan-related policies is likely to be upgraded to a committee-level body, a report commissioned by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said. As Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is increasingly likely to upgrade the CCP’s Central Leading Group for Taiwan Affairs, Taiwanese authorities should prepare by researching Xi and the CCP, the report said. At the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee of the CCP, which ended on Thursday last week, the party set a target of 2029 for the completion of some tasks, meaning that Xi is likely preparing to
US-CHINA TRADE DISPUTE: Despite Beijing’s offer of preferential treatment, the lure of China has dimmed as Taiwanese and international investors move out Japan and the US have become the favored destinations for Taiwanese graduates as China’s attraction has waned over the years, the Ministry of Labor said. According to the ministry’s latest income and employment advisory published this month, 3,215 Taiwanese university graduates from the class of 2020 went to Japan, surpassing for the first time the 2,881 graduates who went to China. A total of 2,300 graduates from the class of 2021 went to the US, compared with the 2,262 who went to China, the document showed. The trend continued for the class of 2023, of whom 1,460 went to Japan, 1,334 went to