Long-time political activist Shih Ming-te (施明德) yesterday announced his presidential bid, saying that he aimed to bring about cross-strait reconciliation and implement social justice, while lashing out at “conventional” politicians who he said had betrayed the public.
“In each successive administration, we see politicians betraying their ideologies, tearing the nation apart and losing direction,” Shih, a founding member of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), who broke ties with the party in 2000, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday morning. “There is no leadership in Taiwan, just decisions based on the interaction of power and interests, and the public no longer has any expectations of a new dawn.”
“Along the path of revolution, I have made narrow escapes from the dictator’s knife, and eventually, I knew I would have to engage in a duel with these dirty politicians,” Shih said.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
He promised that, once elected, he would work to bring about reconciliation between the nation’s political parties, as well as between Taiwan and China; he also vowed to realize social justice and put an immediate end to government corruption.
He called for both the Republic of China (ROC) and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to work together to form a political entity under what he described as a “larger one China” framework, adding that developments in the cross-strait relationship should be based on the reality that the ROC and the PRC are separate political entities.
“The definition of ‘one China’ has been made too narrow, and in reality it is just taken to mean the PRC,” Shih said. “This is something that the 23 million people of the ROC cannot accept, and I propose to replace it with the ‘larger one China’ framework to bring about reconciliation.”
Under the “larger one China” framework, Shih said, the ROC and the PRC would cease being rivals, and would promise not to take military action against each other, while each side would enjoy the right to take part in international organizations and to establish diplomatic ties with other nations.
Shih said he would assign posts in the central government and the state-run businesses to candidates from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), the Democratic Progressive Party, elites and people under 39.
“My idea is to put an end to the one-party regime or one-party presidential system, and make the president a truly national president,” Shih said.
He went on to say that he would also seek to modernize the legal system in Taiwan, as most of the laws framed in China by the KMT regime 70 years ago.
However, Shih said that it could take a long time to reform the laws, therefore, he proposed creating legal reform committees overseen by the president, with the participation of progressive civic groups.
“When we have finished the law amendment proposals, we would bypass the malicious Legislative Yuan and put the proposals to direct referendums to allow the public to decide whether to put them into effect,” Shih said.
He said he deliberately picked yesterday to announce his presidential bid because it marked the date on which he was released from prison for the last time 25 years ago.
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
Another wave of cold air would affect Taiwan starting from Friday and could evolve into a continental cold mass, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Temperatures could drop below 10°C across Taiwan on Monday and Tuesday next week, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. Seasonal northeasterly winds could bring rain, he said. Meanwhile, due to the continental cold mass and radiative cooling, it would be cold in northern and northeastern Taiwan today and tomorrow, according to the CWA. From last night to this morning, temperatures could drop below 10°C in northern Taiwan, it said. A thin coat of snow
RSS