A major controversy facing the Tsai administration has broken out following the revelation of a cigarette smuggling scandal involving National Security Bureau security agents that participated in president Tsai Ing-wen’s recent trip to America and overseas Caribbean allies of Taiwan...
An unusual split has opened up in the NPP with NPP legislator Hsu Yung-ming suggesting that the party should keep its options open with regards to the idea of running a presidential candidate in 2020 elections...
The new chair of the NPP was decided earlier this month, with lawyer Handy Chiu becoming the party’s new leader. Similarly, the second central committee of the party was also elected, consisting of eighteen party members. The announcement of the new chair took place on February 15th...
In a surprise turn of events, NPP chair Huang Kuo-chang announced earlier this week that he will not be pursuing reelection for party chair next month. Party heavyweight Freddy Lim has also announced that he is not interested in pursuing the position. Who, then, will be the next chair of the NPP and how will chair elections affect the course of the party as a whole?...
Controversy has broken out after the NPP’s first general meeting for members was held last Saturday in Xindian. Namely, criticisms of the party have arisen from indigenous members of the party and others after a proposal that the central committee of the NPP should have at least one indigenous member and that no gender should have less than one-third representation on the central committee was voted down...
In a day full of upsets, perhaps the most unremarked upon event was the surprise triumph of the NPP in securing sixteen city council seats and the SDP in securing one city council seat. Two of these candidates, the NPP’s Lin Ying-meng and the SDP’s Miao Poya make history as Taiwan’s first openly lesbian city councilors...
What emerges from a televised debate held on November 15th between New Power Party (NPP) chair Huang Kuo-chang and Tseng Pin-chieh, a professor at the College of Law at National Chung Cheng University, should be highly concerning to supporters of marriage equality in Taiwan. Namely, Tseng’s comments in the debate are highly indicative of what the aims of anti-gay groups in Taiwan are in their referendum against marriage equality, what their current strategy is, and what their endgame likely is...
The Taiwan High Court ruling to uphold the acquittal of 22 Sunflower Movement activists for their actions during the 2014 occupation of the Legislative Yuan maintains a previous ruling approximately one year ago that found Sunflower Movement activists not guilty on the basis that their actions were justified civil disobedience. What is this indicative of, in reflecting on close to four years since the movement broke out and the year since the previous ruling?...