Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Legislator Tsai Pi-ru (蔡壁如) yesterday resigned after her alma mater found that her master’s thesis contained plagiarized sections.
Takming University of Science and Technology — where Tsai obtained a master’s degree in 2019 — on Thursday revoked the degree after a committee found she had plagiarized material for her thesis.
According to the TPP’s legislator-at-large nominee list from 2020, Shin Kong Life Insurance Co deputy chief executive Cynthia Wu (吳欣盈) is to replace Tsai.
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
Earlier yesterday, Tsai denied the accusations, telling a news conference that the thesis was her own work.
She said she would wait for the full review report from the university, but was “willing to resign as legislator if flaws are found.”
“When I entered the master’s program it was not to make my educational background look better on paper, it was to fulfill work requirements, as I was new to public office,” she said. “I wanted to improve my understanding of how social media are used in politics, the types of things politicians post about and how social media affect results at the polls.”
Tsai’s thesis was about the attention given to municipal issues on social media, which required her to collect a large amount of data and to cite many sources, she said.
“If in that process I accidentally made omissions, I am willing to own up to my mistake,” she said. “I hope the committee will make its findings public so that they can serve as an example for improvement, for myself and others.”
PUBLIC ATTENTION
National Chengchi University professor Tsai Tseng-chia (蔡增家) said the case is expected to garner more public attention.
“The public is going to be watching this, so the review committee should publish its findings and let the public be part of the review process,” he said. “Otherwise, it will be impossible for anyone to have any substantive discussion on whether Tsai Pi-ru was at fault. The situation will only result in people attacking each other.”
Echoing similar comments from Tsai Pi-ru, Tsai Tseng-chia said making the committee’s findings public would help her make improvements to her academic writing and better equip her to defend herself against the allegations.
Tsai Pi-ru said she believes the parts of the thesis on daycare and the aging population was deemed problematic.
“[Takming] university said I had not included a source. I told them the source was a Facebook post by a city councilor, but as there is no way to search for specific posts on Facebook, I could not go back and make a proper citation,” she said.
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai
Four China Coast Guard ships briefly sailed through prohibited waters near Kinmen County, Taipei said, urging Beijing to stop actions that endanger navigation safety. The Chinese ships entered waters south of Kinmen, 5km from the Chinese city of Xiamen, at about 3:30pm on Monday, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement later the same day. The ships “sailed out of our prohibited and restricted waters” about an hour later, the agency said, urging Beijing to immediately stop “behavior that endangers navigation safety.” Ministry of National Defense spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) yesterday told reporters that Taiwan would boost support to the Coast Guard