The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) plans to make TPP legislator-at-large-elect Lai Hsiang-lin (賴香伶) its legislative caucus convener, TPP legislator-at-large-elect Tsai Pi-ju (蔡壁如) said yesterday.
Lai is the former Taipei Department of Labor commissioner and Tsai is a former Taipei City Government adviser.
The TPP secured five legislator-at-large seats in Saturday’s elections and may form a legislative caucus.
Photo: Shen Pei-yao, Taipei Times
Tsai, a close aide to Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), who is the TPP chairman, said that the party also plans to make TPP legislator-at-large-elect Jang Chyi-lu (張其祿) its deputy convener.
Jang is the dean of National Sun Yat-sen University College of Social Sciences.
Citing Ko’s remark about the party going down its own path and not joining the pan-blue or pan-green camp, Tsai said the TPP and the New Power Party (NPP) have many common ideals, so the TPP would like to talk with the NPP.
As long as proposed policies or legislation are beneficial to the public interest, the TPP would cooperate with other parties, she said, adding that it is also considering forming an alliance of opposition parties.
Ko on Sunday at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport answered questions about the party’s plans before departing for a trip to Europe including the Czech Republic, Latvia, Estonia and Finland.
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won an absolute majority at the legislature, so the TPP cannot become a “critical minority” party that he hoped it would be, Ko said.
“The DPP can do whatever it wants,” he said, adding that the legislative speaker and deputy legislative speaker are likely to be from the DPP.
Asked how Taiwan can resolve a cross-strait deadlock, Ko said he had heard people saying that “the Chinese Communist Party has been the Chinese Nationalist Party’s [KMT] worst teammate” during the presidential election.
The election results reflect the attitude of Taiwanese, so “facing the problem is the first step to solving the problem,” Ko said.
The Chinese government should think about why it often provides “incentives to benefit Taiwanese, and yet Taiwanese run farther and farther away from it,” which implies that something is wrong with Beijing’s long-term policy of suppressing Taiwan, he said.
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