President Lai Ching-te is calling a rare meeting of all five branches of the government in an attempt to bridge the wide political divide in Taiwan. It comes as he faces an increasingly hostile political environment.
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00:00Taiwan's President Lai Ching-tung has called a meeting of the heads of all five branches
00:04of government.
00:05This is the first time that talks like this have been called by the President and it comes
00:09as Lai faces an increasingly hostile political situation.
00:13Rick Lauer is live outside the Presidential Office.
00:16Rick, what do we know about this meeting?
00:21So in just over an hour, Lai will be welcoming the heads of Taiwan's five branches of government
00:26here to the Presidential Office, including the judiciary and the legislature, for a meeting
00:31to address what the Presidential Office is saying are serious challenges posed by the
00:36current economic and political situation at home and abroad.
00:40The big problem that Lai is facing is a political deadlock between his cabinet, which is run
00:46by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, or the DPP, and the legislature, where the
00:51main opposition party, the Kuomintang, or KMT, along with another smaller opposition
00:56party, have the majority.
00:58And the key attendee of today's meeting will be the leader of the legislature, a KMT lawmaker
01:05called Hang Kuo-yu.
01:07There's a huge amount of bad blood between Taiwan's two major political parties.
01:13And the legislature has really been going after Lai's government.
01:16They've been smacking down DPP bills, they've been putting through reforms that give more
01:20power to the legislature, more oversight over the executive branch, and crucially,
01:25they've also stripped much of the central budget of the government, the central government
01:31budget.
01:32Now, Lai says this in particular will cripple Taiwan internationally.
01:37He's worried about defense spending, defense spending that he says he needs to counter
01:41China, which, of course, claims Taiwan as part of its sovereign territory.
01:45Now, in a sign of just what a critical moment this is for Lai, this is actually the first
01:50time that a Taiwan president has called a meeting like this, a rare occasion where the
01:55five usually separate branches of the government will be together.
02:00Rick, given that bad blood you mentioned, how likely is this meeting to resolve the
02:05political crisis?
02:07Well, it's going to be incredibly hard for Lai to bridge that political divide.
02:15Two major political parties fundamentally disagree on one of Taiwan's big issues, that's
02:21how to deal with China.
02:23The ruling Democratic Progressive Party wants to keep China at arm's length, whilst the
02:27opposition, Kuomintang, KMT, they prefer closer ties with Beijing.
02:33It's also going to be hard for Lai to stem escalating political hostilities.
02:38There's already been fights inside the legislature, protests and counter-protests on the street,
02:43and court battles.
02:45Significantly, there's also been reclaim, bids to reclaim, to recall the lawmakers from
02:54different sides.
02:55The DPP wants to rebalance the power inside the legislature, so it's launched petitions
03:00to recall KMT lawmakers.
03:02More than 20 KMT lawmakers face losing their seats.
03:07But at this meeting in the presidential office here, Lai will be looking to make some ground
03:12when it comes to that government budget, as he says that is an existential crisis for
03:17Taiwan.