Taiwan's beleaguered People First Party (PFP), the island's second-largest opposition party, has ruled out forming a coalition government with the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, according to one of the party's core officials.
Chang Hsien-yao, director of the PFP's Centre for Policy Research, told a forum in Hong Kong yesterday that the prospect of a formal alliance, or of PFP politicians becoming cabinet members, had not been discussed during the controversial meeting between PFP chairman James Soong Chu-yu and President Chen Shui-bian.
'The Chen-Soong talk was all about cross-strait issues and nothing else,' said Mr Chang, a member of the Legislative Yuan who accompanied Mr Soong to the mainland this month.
It would be 'absolutely impossible' for the PFP to agree to President Chen's request to enter a coalition government 'unless the DPP relinquishes its Taiwan independence stance', he said. The DPP has been eager to add the PFP's 34 seats in the legislature to the 101 the 'pan-green' camp won in December's election.
But Mr Chang vowed that the PFP would never compromise its political commitments on cross-strait issues. 'The orange is orange ... it will never turn green,' he said, referring to the party colours of the PFP and the DPP.
The 10-point consensus reached between Mr Soong and President Chen in February had not been the result of any outside influence, Mr Chang said. However, Mr Soong said on Wednesday he had agreed to meet President Chen at the urging of the US.