Motion to Exclude Foreign Nationalities from Academicians’ Elections Elicits Disputes

 Motion to Exclude Foreign Nationalities from Academicians’ Elections Elicits Disputes

Source: UDN

April 24, 2020

The first term of James Liao (廖俊智), who was elected as Academia Sinica President in 2016, is slated to expire next year. While interpellating Liao at the Legislative Education Committee yesterday, DPP legislator Fan Yun (范雲) blurted out congratulations to Liao for his re-election, which was not denied by the latter. Soon afterwards, the Academia Sinica confirmed the matter by saying that in a meeting in mid April, the Council of Academia Sinica had approved Liao’s re-election.  

In addition, the Academia Sinica is slated to elect new academicians in July. As no regulations exist on the nationality of Academia Sinica academicians, many of them don’t possess ROC citizenship. In a meeting of the Legislative Education Committee yesterday, three legislators, including Fan Yun, introduced a motion demanding that in order to ensure that all academicians elected “must be ROC nationals” in the future, the Academia Sinica re-examine its election system for academicians to fully implement nationality checks, and that those without ROC nationality could only be elected as “honorary academicians.” 

This motion elicited disputes, with several academicians describing the move as “national isolationism” yesterday.

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