Gov’t Axed Plan to Commission PTS for Int’l Platform Said to Be Connected to Tsai-Su Infighting over Candidate for PTS Chairman

 Gov’t Axed Plan to Commission PTS for Int’l Platform Said to Be Connected to Tsai-Su Infighting over Candidate for PTS Chairman

Source: UDN

July 31, 2020

On July 29, the Culture Ministry suddenly called off its plan to commission Public Television Service (PTS) for an international video programming platform as disputes had risen about whether the government had intervened in PTS.  

In a press conference yesterday, Alicia Wang (王育敏), director of the KMT's Culture and Communications Committee, pointed out that according to a confidential document leaked from the Presidential Office last April, Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) had met with Hu Yuan-hui (胡元輝), a board member of Radio Taiwan International, also the founder of Newtalk, as Su wanted to have Hu take up the position of PTS chairman, but President Tsai Ing-wen preferred to have Chiang Chun-nan (江春男), vice chairman of the General Association of Chinese Culture, at the helm of PTS.  

Wang went on to say that on the surface, what everyone saw was a dispute over the Culture Ministry commissioning PTS to develop an international channel, adding that in fact, this was the result of an internal struggle between DPP high-echelon officials. Wang said she hoped that Tsai would give a clear explanation to the public.  

Yesterday afternoon, the Cabinet rebutted Wang’s accusation, saying that this was not true.

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