Following a hearing on Tuesday on alleged ties between the China Youth Corps and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), corps director Ger Yeong-kuang (葛永光) said the allegation would cause a loss of public trust in the government.
The hearing was the second by the Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee to probe the KMT’s potential ties to the corps, which was directed by former president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) for 21 years before he was succeeded by other KMT heavyweights.
The organization would not rule out legal action if the committee deliberately overlooks evidence and forcibly rules it a KMT affiliate, Ger said.
Photo: Yang Mien-chieh, Taipei Times
Ger said he was not opposed to the corps being transferred to government ownership, but added that he would organize a protest should such a decision affect the livelihood of the organization’s 5,000 workers.
The corps was founded and guided by the government, with its members originally selected by the Executive Yuan, he said.
It has been run independently and is not a tool to control society, Ger said, adding that many Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) members have attended its activities.
Ger shrugged off the committee’s assumption that reports delivered by former corps president Jeanne Li (李鍾桂) at meetings of the KMT Central Standing Committee about the organization’s activities suggest a link.
Such an association of ties is far-fetched, Ger said, adding that he was willing to deliver reports to the DPP to help it gain a better understanding of the corps’ affairs.
As a government body, the party assets committee should be fair and impartial, but chairman Lin Feng-jeng (林峰正) appears to have already made up his mind on the matter, Ger said.
The stakeholders in the case are not KMT members, but rather the organization’s 5,000 workers, teachers and their families, Ger said, adding that they would all protest if their livelihood is affected.
The idea of handing control of the corps to the central government is not new, as there have been talks about merging the organization with the Ministry of Education’s Youth Development Administration into a new agency, he said.
“I am open to discussions,” Ger said.
While such a move would ensure better job security for the corps’ staff, it might not be suitable, as they often work late into the evening, he added.
“Taiwan is a democracy, but some people want to destroy the foundation of that democracy,” Ger said.
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
RSS