President Chen Shui-bian (
"Events will repeat those of four years ago," Chen told reporters yesterday. "After the pan-blues lose the election, crowds will gather outside the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) headquarters to ask party Chairman Lien Chan (
"Clearly Lien will have to step down and take responsibility for the party's failure and many political observers believe that the speaker of the Legislative Yuan, Wang Jin-pyng (
PHOTO: CHIANG YING-YING, TAIPEI TIMES
`Chaos will end'
The president made a campaign tour of eastern Taiwan by train during which he took the opportunity to talk to the media. Chen stressed that his victory would bring the nation stability in political interaction, economic development, social order and the cross-strait relationship.
"The Legislative Yuan has become the biggest source of chaos in Taiwan because in the past few years two thugs were manipulating it, bringing about irrational boycotts. But we are confident that after wining the presidential election this chaos will end," Chen said.
Chen said he expected his victory to cause a major reorganization of the pan-blue camp; both the KMT and its ally, the People First Party (PFP), would have to make huge changes to meet the expectations of Taiwanese society.
"The KMT, under Wang Jin-pyng's leadership will have to follow the localization trend," Chen said. "If they don't, pro-localization heavyweights will leave the party."
"As for the PFP, since it is a one-person party, Chairman James Soong (
Chen stressed that those KMT legislators who were disappointed with the party and some other independents with good reputations would be willing to cooperate with the DPP.
"Therefore, we do not even have to wait for the results of the year-end legislative elections," Chen said. "The majority alliance can be realized after March 20."
However, Chen would not say whether the DPP has contacted any KMT or independent legislators to discuss this issue.
Old hat
Commenting on the impact of the pan-blue camp's "Oppose A-bian and change the president" rally last Saturday, Chen said that such a campaign activity only appealed to core supporters but did not attract new support.
"I retain my prediction that the DPP will win by a narrow margin of between 3 and 5 percent, which represents around 300,000 to 500,000 ballots.
Chen then criticized Lien and Soong for their controversial gesture on Saturday of prostrating themselves to kiss the ground.
False humility
"What Lien and Soong did during the rally was simply a campaign gimmick," Chen said, adding that they chose the wrong day for a display of humility.
"If not, we hope that they can learn from the former German chancellor Willy Brandt, who [in Warsaw in 1970] kneeled and kissed the ground of Poland to repent for Germany's crime against that country, and apologize on Feb. 28 for their crimes in slaughtering Taiwanese people during the 228 incident in 1947, " Chen said.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS