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Mr Chen is set to leave office at the end of his second and final term in May, and his Cabinet will step down with him. -- PHOTO: AP
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TAIPEI - PRESIDENT Chen Shui Bian will ask Taiwan's incumbent premier to stay on to help provide political stability, a spokesman said on Saturday, after he failed to reach agreement with the opposition on a new Cabinet.
The Cabinet resigned on Thursday, two weeks after the opposition Nationalist Party humiliated Mr Chen's ruling Democratic Progressive Party in legislative elections - winning 81 seats in the 113-seat body to 27 for the DPP. Five seats went to Nationalist allies.
'For political stability and effective governance, the president will ask Premier Chang Chun Csiung to stay on,' presidential spokesman Lee Nan Yang told a group of reporters in the eastern city of Yilan, where he was accompanying Mr Chen on a trip.
Mr Chen met Nationalist Party Chairman Wu Poh Hsiung on Thursday to discuss various issues related to Taiwan's March 22 presidential elections, including the appointment of a new premier - the Cabinet's first minister. The two did not reach any agreement, however.
Mr Chen is set to leave office at the end of his second and final term in May, and his Cabinet will step down with him.
The Cabinet is ultimately responsible to the president, who appoints the premier. Cabinet ministers also answer questions from the island's lawmakers when the legislature is in session. It is customary for ministers to leave en masse before a new legislature is sworn in - this time on Feb 1.
The Nationalists' Ma Ying Jeou goes up against Frank Hsieh of the DPP in the presidential poll. Mr Ma is a heavy favourite to win. -- AP
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