Taipei Times
Date: Mar 05, 2016
By: Abraham Gerber / Staff reporter Staff Reporter
President-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) should take advantage of her historic election to use women to fill at least one-third of Cabinet posts, women’s rights advocates said yesterday.

Campaigners from 14 women’s rights organizations gathered at a news conference inside the Legislative Yuan to call on Tsai to make good on a 2012 electoral promise to appoint women to at least one-third of all Cabinet and committee posts.

“We have a lot of hope in [Tsai], because Taiwan’s presidents have done such an awful job and also because her election represents the culmination of the efforts of Taiwan’s entire feminist movement. That a woman like her — without any special political background — could become Taiwan’s president is the fruit of the work of all of our organizations,” Awakening Foundation Chairperson Shen Hsiu-hua (沈秀華) said.

“Because she is the product of progressive forces, we hope that she will continue to push the movement forward,” she added.

Taiwan Women’s Link executive secretary Hsiung Chen-yu (熊晨妤) said that the percentage of women in Cabinets under the administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) had fallen almost continuously, reaching a low of 11.4 percent, which was well below the 25 percent Ma promised before taking office.     [FULL  STORY]