Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) yesterday said that the party put together its legislator-at-large list in meticulous fashion and he was certain it would garner interest and approval, despite the discontent it has generated.
Wu made the remarks at the meeting of party representatives, who voted on the revised list passed by the party’s Central Standing Committee a day earlier.
The list has taken into consideration public expectations of the KMT and the political situation in Taiwan, Wu said.
Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Taipei Times
The list is a balance of functionality and representation for areas including education, sports, public sanitation and medicine, immigrant spouses, the high-tech industry, young people, labor rights, civil servants, military personnel and overseas compatriots, he said.
Wu asked party members to be understanding that the KMT might have passed over some people, but it could only “correct the wrongs” of the current administration if it wins at the ballot box in January.
All except one of the 34 candidates were approved yesterday, with the exception of former Mainland Affairs Council deputy minister Chang Hsien-yao (張顯耀), who received 19 “no” votes.
KMT Culture and Communications Committee deputy director-general Cheng Mei-hua (程美華) said that according to party regulations, everyone listed after Chang would move up one place, while Wu, as the party chairman, would nominate a member for the vacated 34th and lowest ranking.
Asked about the votes he received to be a legislator-at-large — 127 for and 58 against — Wu said that it was normal to receive some “no” votes.
The KMT would be an authoritarian party if he only got “yes” votes, he said.
Meanwhile, retired general Wu Sz-huai (吳斯懷) — who took fourth place on the list, despite criticism over his attendance at an event in Beijing in 2016 to celebrate the 150th anniversary of Sun Yat-sen’s (孫逸仙) birth and standing for the Chinese national anthem — yesterday said in his introduction at the meeting that he “pledges to defend the Republic of China [ROC] for the rest of his life.”
The ROC is “the one founded in 1911 by the KMT and not the ROC Taiwan that [President] Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) speaks of,” Wu Sz-huai said.
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