The Presidential Office yesterday fended off criticism that Presidential Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) nominations of 11 Control Yuan members runs counter to a long-term plan to abolish the watchdog agency, saying that its stance remains unchanged.
The current Control Yuan president, vice president and 16 members were all nominated by former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and approved by the previous legislature, Presidential Office spokesman Alex Huang (黃重諺) said.
“However, [Tsai was elected in] last year’s Jan. 16 presidential election with a new mandate; the new nominations made to fill the current vacancies ... will make it more representative of that mandate,” he said.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
Tsai’s nominees were also picked to ensure that the Control Yuan is able to function properly — supervising government agencies and offering assistance to people whose rights have been infringed on due to miscarriages of justice — before the Constitution is amended to pave the way for the agency’s abolition, Huang said.
All 11 nominees are top-notch professionals in their respective fields, which include the environment, public health, the law and human rights, social welfare and finance, he said.
“We must stress that it has been our consistent stance to abrogate the Control Yuan through constitutional amendment. This stance remains unchanged,” Huang said.
According to Article 7 of the Additional Articles of the Republic of China (ROC) Constitution, the Control Yuan “shall consist of 29 members, including a president and a vice president, all of whom shall serve a term of six years.”
Their nominations require the consent of the legislature.
Huang’s remarks came a few hours after the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) held a news conference in Taipei to label the nominations a slap in the face of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
“The DPP has for years advocated the abolition of the Control Yuan and the Examination Yuan... Yet after the party gained power, it swiftly nominated candidates to fill the vacancies at the Control Yuan,” KMT Culture and Communications Committee deputy director Tang Te-ming (唐德明) said.
Given the nominees’ backgrounds, their selection was apparently a “political reward” from the DPP for their service or electoral support, Tang said, citing attorney Yang Fang-wan (楊芳婉), who represented former first lady Wu Shu-jen (吳淑珍) in her corruption trial, and People First Party Deputy Secretary-General Liu Wen-hsiung (劉文雄) as examples.
Other nominees include former Presidential Office secretary-general Chen Shih-meng (陳師孟); former activist and Taipei City Government employee Wang Yu-ling (王幼玲); Deputy Minister of Overseas Community Affairs Tien Chiu-chin (田秋堇); former independent legislator Walis Perin; Lin Sheng-fong (林盛豐), a professor; Chang Wu-shou (張武修), a physician; lawyer Kao Yung-cheng (高涌誠); former DPP legislator Jao Yung-ching (趙永清); and judge Tsai Chung-yi (蔡崇義).
Vice President Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) introduced the 11 nominees to the public at a news conference at the Presidential Office Building after they met earlier in the day with Tsai.
Saying the nominations were aimed at maintaining the Control Yuan’s role of supervising and safeguarding human rights, Chen Chien-jen said he hoped the nominees’ experience would help them undertake the watchdog’s duties.
As the nominees would only be serving the remaining term of their predecessors, their terms are set to expire on July 31, 2020, he said.
“We have communicated with Legislative Speaker [Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全)] about the confirmation of their nominations. He promised to arrange for a review of their cases in the legislature as soon as possible,” Chen Chien-jen said, adding that he expected the nominations to be approved within one to two months.
Taiwan does not exclude the possibility of having formal diplomatic relations with countries that also have formal ties with China, regardless of Beijing’s stance, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Sunday. There was speculation in 2012 that Honduras was attempting to have simultaneous diplomatic relations with Taiwan and China, an idea that then-minister of foreign affairs David Lin (林永樂) rejected. Honduras severed formal ties with Taiwan on Sunday morning after establishing diplomatic relations with Beijing. President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration has taken a more practical approach to relations with like-minded countries since assuming government in 2016. Previous administrations took the
WASHED ASHORE: Of the 16 bodies discovered along Taiwan’s west coast this month, two were Vietnamese and five were Taiwanese, coast guard officials said Minister of Justice Tsai Ching-hsiang (蔡清祥) said that he has instructed prosecutors and maritime authorities to launch investigations after 16 bodies were found along Taiwan’s west coast this month, amid speculation that they were victims of smuggling or human trafficking rings. Coast Guard Administration (CGA) officials said the bodies, most of which had washed ashore, were found by coast guard personnel and local residents along the coastline from Keelung to Kaohsiung. Thirteen of the bodies are male and three are female, the CGA said, adding that items found on the bodies indicate that two of the men were Vietnamese, while three men
TASK FORCE DISPATCHED: MOFA said it would assist state employees with repatriation or relocation to other ally nations in the region after Tegucigalpa severed ties The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) on Monday ordered Honduras to vacate its embassy in Taiwan within 30 days of Sunday after Tegucigalpa made a similar demand of Taiwan. Taipei on Monday announced that it had cut ties with Honduras after the Central American nation earlier said in a statement that it had established ties with Beijing and ended its diplomatic relationship with Taiwan. Following the announcements, Honduran Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Antonio Garcia spoke on Honduran television saying that Taiwan would be required to vacate its embassy in the Honduran capital. In Taipei, MOFA later told a news conference that “according
CHINA TRIP: The former president said he hoped the two sides of the Taiwan Strait would work together to pursue peace, avoid war and strive to ‘revitalize China’ Former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday began a 12-day tour of China with a visit to the Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum in Nanjing. He paid tribute to Sun Yat-sen (孫逸仙), a founder of the Republic of China, giving a short speech and then bowing in front of the memorial. “The people of both sides of the Taiwan Strait belong to the Chinese nation, are children of Yandi (炎帝) and Huangdi (黃帝),” he told reporters who had been allowed to follow him on the trip, referring to figures said to have founded of the Han ethnicity in ancient China. Ma has framed the trip as