TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – President-elect Lai Ching-te (賴清德) is likely to pick former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chair Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) as premier and former Culture Minister Cheng Li-chun (鄭麗君) as vice premier, reports said Tuesday (April 9).
The full list of new ministers is expected to be announced on Friday (April 12), per the Liberty Times. The new Cabinet is expected to be sworn in on the same day as the president on May 20.
Cho, 65, started his political career at the Taipei City Council and was later elected as a legislator. He served in secretary-general positions at the DPP and at the Cabinet when Lai was premier.
Cho was elected DPP chair in 2019 but left the position when President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) was re-elected to a second and final term as president in 2020.
Cheng, 54, who studied in Paris, served as culture minister from 2016 to 2020, during Tsai’s first term as president. Since the Jan. 13 presidential election, the media has tipped her as a potential premier.
Other appointments likely to be made include Wellington Koo (顧立雄) as defense minister, the Liberty Times reported. The attorney and current National Security Council (NSC) secretary general would be only the seventh civilian to hold the military post, as most of Taiwan’s defense ministers have been retired generals or admirals.
He would be succeeded at the NSC by current Foreign Minister Joseph Wu (吳釗燮), who already served in the position in 2016-2017. There was no word, however, on who might take over Wu’s role at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA).
Wu emerged as a vocal spokesperson for Taiwan amid China’s increasingly aggressive posture and the poaching of Taipei’s diplomatic allies.
The chief of the country’s top intelligence agency, the National Security Bureau (NSB), is likely to remain. Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) was a former MOFA diplomat.
Koo, Wu, and Tsai are seen as having various contacts with the outside world, making them suitable to continue advocating for Taiwan in international spaces, according to commentators.
