President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) is expected to step down as chairman of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) today to shoulder responsibility for the pan-green camp's failure to win a legislative majority in Saturday's poll.
"The president will tender his resignation before [today's] weekly Central Standing Committee meeting to assume full responsibility for the election," DPP legislative caucus leader Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) told reporters after speaking with Chen at the Presidential Office last night. "The resignation of party officials and their replacements will be dealt with by the new chairman."
It is understood that the acting chairman will be elected from among the members of the Central Standing Committee.
Chen remained in the Presidential Office yesterday morning and canceled all afternoon activities. He called in party heavyweights to the Presidential Office for talks in the afternoon.
They included Vice President Annette Lu (
DPP members have been calling for Chen's resignation as party chairman since Saturday night.
"If he can't be held responsible, who can?" asked DPP Legislator Tony Jian (
Jian attributed the party's lackluster performance to Chen's choice of campaign topics and slogans.
"Take the `soft coup' theory for example. Hadn't he wanted harmony between the ruling and opposition parties and didn't he keep calling for reconciliation with them?" he asked. "His provocative and aggressive approach to the campaign simply made centrist voters so sick and tired of the party that they decided not to cast their ballots."
Jian said that party operations would not be interrupted even if Chen did resign from the chairmanship, because Central Standing Committee members were the highest decision-making body in the party.
Echoing Jian's argument, DPP Legislator Lee Chun-yee (
"Nobody wants the president to step down from the presidency but he should quit the [chairmanship] and take full responsibility for defeat in accordance with party tradition," he said.
DPP Legislator Lin Yu-sheng (
"If he has any political wisdom, he should relinquish control and let younger talent take over at the party's helm," he said.
Saying the issue was sensitive, unseated DPP Legislator Chiu Chui-chen (
The DPP nominated seven candidates and the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) nominated two candidates in Chiu's electorate of Taoyuan County, but together the pan-green camp won only five of the 13 seats. The pan-blue camp nominated 10 and eight were elected.
When asked by the media yesterday if Chen or Yu should be held responsible for the election, Annette Lu said that it was unfair to ask individuals to assume all of the responsibility for the election when the matter still required thorough examination.
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
NO WORK, CLASS: President William Lai urged people in the eastern, southern and northern parts of the country to be on alert, with Typhoon Kong-rey approaching Typhoon Kong-rey is expected to make landfall on Taiwan’s east coast today, with work and classes canceled nationwide. Packing gusts of nearly 300kph, the storm yesterday intensified into a typhoon and was expected to gain even more strength before hitting Taitung County, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said. The storm is forecast to cross Taiwan’s south, enter the Taiwan Strait and head toward China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The CWA labeled the storm a “strong typhoon,” the most powerful on its scale. Up to 1.2m of rainfall was expected in mountainous areas of eastern Taiwan and destructive winds are likely
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
RSS