President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday nominated former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) vice chairman John Kuan (關中) as head of the Examination Yuan and former Control Yuan member Chen Jinn-lih (陳進利) as vice president of the Control Yuan.
Ma also nominated three Examination Yuan members and five grand justices. The nomination of Kuan, Chen and the three Examination Yuan members was presented after Ma’s original nominations of Chang Chun-yen (張俊彥) as Examination Yuan president, Shen Fu-hsiung (沈富雄) as Control Yuan vice president and three other nominees affiliated with the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) were rejected.
“The nominees are great choices, and we hope the legislature will approve the nominations,” Ma said when receiving the nominees at the Presidential Office yesteday.
PHOTO: CNA
Kuan, 68, had served as vice president of the Examination Yuan. He resigned as the KMT vice chairman after being informed of the nomination, and brushed aside claims that his position was a reward for his campaign efforts during the presidential election.
“If you know what I’ve achieved during the six years in the Examination Yuan and what I’ve contributed to related policies and reforms, you will know that I am an expert in the field,” Kuan said.
When asked about his long-term involvement in KMT affairs, Kuan said he would seek to strike a balance between party politics and the neutrality required of civil servants.
“I believe I will be able to make some contributions to establishing the civil office system with my expertise and experience,” he said.
Chen vowed to assist Control Yuan President Wang Chien-shien to clamp down on corruption, and said the Control Yuan should list the “319 shooting” investigation as a priority.
The “319 shooting” refers to the election-eve attack on former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and former vice-president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) on March 19, 2004.
Chen Jinn-lih, a member of the Amis tribe, will become the first Control Yuan vice president with an Aboriginal background if the Legislative Yuan approves his nomination.
Chang had dropped out of the legislative confirmation vote in July following allegations that he had accepted payments from Polaris Securities Co during his time as president of National Chiao Tung University.
The three Control Yuan nominees are former Control Yuan member Yeh Yao-peng (葉耀鵬), National Union of Nurses president Yin Jeo-chen (尹祚芊) and Chen Yung-hsiang (陳永祥), a civil engineering professor at National Taiwan University.
The five nominees for the Council of Grand Justices are attorney and National Taiwan University (NTU) law professor Huang Mao-jung (黃茂榮), National Chengchi University law professor Chen Ming (陳敏), Supreme Administrative Court judge Yeh Bai-xiu (葉百修), Academia Sinica researcher Chen Hsin-min (陳新民) and Chen Chun-sheng (陳春生), an honorary professor with National Taiwan University’s Graduate Institute of National Development.
The Presidential Office will present the nominations to the Legislative Yuan on Friday for approval.
Wang Chien-shien said Ma had made a good choice in nominating Chen Jinn-lih as Control Yuan vice president.
“Not many Aborigines have had the opportunity to work for Yuan-level governmental agencies in the past,” he said. “If he were to become vice president of the Control Yuan, it would be an encouragement to Aborigines and would meet with the expectations of Aboriginal people.”
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus opposed Kuan’s nomination.
DPP Legislator Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯) told a press conference that a person like Kuan, who has been deeply involved with the KMT’s affairs, would be incapable of creating fair mechanisms for screening qualified government officials.
Defending Ma’s nomination of Kuan, KMT caucus deputy secretary-general Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇) said Kuan was qualified, given his experience as vice president of the Examination Yuan and minister of the civil service.
Additional reporting by Shih Hsiu-chuan, Flora Wang and Jimmy Chuang
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) and Chunghwa Telecom yesterday confirmed that an international undersea cable near Keelung Harbor had been cut by a Chinese ship, the Shunxin-39, a freighter registered in Cameroon. Chunghwa Telecom said the cable had its own backup equipment, and the incident would not affect telecommunications within Taiwan. The CGA said it dispatched a ship under its first fleet after receiving word of the incident and located the Shunxin-39 7 nautical miles (13km) north of Yehliu (野柳) at about 4:40pm on Friday. The CGA demanded that the Shunxin-39 return to seas closer to Keelung Harbor for investigation over the
National Kaohsiung University of Science and Technology (NKUST) yesterday promised it would increase oversight of use of Chinese in course materials, following a social media outcry over instances of simplified Chinese characters being used, including in a final exam. People on Threads wrote that simplified Chinese characters were used on a final exam and in a textbook for a translation course at the university, while the business card of a professor bore the words: “Taiwan Province, China.” Photographs of the exam, the textbook and the business card were posted with the comments. NKUST said that other members of the faculty did not see
The Taipei City Government yesterday said contractors organizing its New Year’s Eve celebrations would be held responsible after a jumbo screen played a Beijing-ran television channel near the event’s end. An image showing China Central Television (CCTV) Channel 3 being displayed was posted on the social media platform Threads, sparking an outcry on the Internet over Beijing’s alleged political infiltration of the municipal government. A Taipei Department of Information and Tourism spokesman said event workers had made a “grave mistake” and that the Television Broadcasts Satellite (TVBS) group had the contract to operate the screens. The city would apply contractual penalties on TVBS
EARTHQUAKE: Taipei and New Taipei City accused a construction company of ignoring the Circular MRT’s original design, causing sections to shift by up to 92cm The Taipei and New Taipei City governments yesterday said they would seek NT$1.93 billion (US$58.6 million) in compensation from the company responsible for building the Circular MRT Line, following damage sustained during an earthquake in April last year that had shuttered a section for months. BES Engineering Corp, a listed company under Core Pacific Group, was accused of ignoring the original design when constructing the MRT line, resulting in negative shear strength resistance and causing sections of the rail line between Jhonghe (中和) and Banciao (板橋) districts to shift by up to 92cm during the April 3 earthquake. The pot bearings on
RSS