Chen Chu

Kiku Chen Chu (born 10 June 1950) is a Taiwanese politician serving as president of the Control Yuan and chairwomen of the National Human Rights Commission since 2020.

Prior to her entrance into politics, Chen was one of the eight prominent dissidents, namely "Kaohsiung Eight", arrested and charged after the Kaohsiung Incident in 1979.

She was put behind bars for almost six years during the martial law period in Taiwan.

Chen had also served in various capacities with the Taipei and Kaohsiung city governments between 1995 and 2000, with the latter being the year when she graduated from the National Sun Yat-sen University (NSYSU) with a master's degree in public affairs.

She then served as Minister of the Council of Labor Affairs, the precursor to present-day Ministry of Labor, in various cabinets between 2000 and 2005.

Chen won the 2006 Kaohsiung mayoral election and became the Republic of China's first directly-elected female mayor of a special municipality.

Chen narrowly defeated the Kuomintang candidate Huang Jun-ying with a margin of just 1,120 votes in the 2006 Kaohsiung mayoral election.

After announcement of the election result, Huang filed two lawsuits against Chen's campaign team, requesting the court to annul the election.

He argued airing of a video, produced by Chen's campaign team, on the eve of the election resulted in his loss.

The Kaohsiung District Court ruled in favor of Huang in one of the lawsuits, thus nullifying the election.

Chen expressed her intention to appeal to the court upon knowing the verdict.

She claimed it would be a political suicide if she accepted the ruling.

While her colleague and Democratic Progressive Party legislator Kuan Bi-ling advised Chen to concede, Chen nonetheless appealed the ruling.

There were speculations on whether Kuan, who lost to Chen during the primaries, made the remark out of personal interest.

The High Court eventually overturned the earlier decision of the Kaohsiung District Court and revalidated the election result on 17 November 2007.

Chen announced, after all legal proceedings against the mayoral election result had ended, that her policy priorities would be the city's transportation, infrastructure construction and environmental protection.

Chen assured the public in April 2009 she would improve the water quality of Chienchen River, nicknamed "Heilungchiang" by the locals for its apparent pollution.

She pledged NT$120 million to implement the water treatment project.

Chen vowed to make Kaohsiung a city not just notable for the beauty of the Love River.

Kaohsiung was the host city of 2009 World Games.

Chen visited China in that year to promote the Games and met with then-Mayor of Beijing Guo Jinlong.

Chen addressed then-President Ma Ying-jeou with his formal title during the meeting with Guo, which garnered much support from her party and the Kaohsiung City Council.

However, she was criticized by several Taiwanese localist groups, including the Taiwan Solidarity Union.

In response, Chen said the trip was meant to be beneficial to Kaohsiung.

In addition to Guo, she also met with then-Mayor of Shanghai Han Zheng and former Chinese Olympic Committee chairman Liu Pong during her trip to China.

The main venue of the games, the World Games Stadium, was designed by Japanese architect Toyo Ito.

Both the groundbreaking and completion of the Stadium occurred during Chen's tenure of mayorship.

The closing ceremony was held in the sold-out World Games Stadium, where President of the International World Games Association Ron Froehlich called the Games a "fantastic success" and declared it "the best ever".

Tourism Bureau of Kaohsiung announced the Games generated nearly US$61 million in revenue for the city.

The city's department stores reported a 15-percent growth in sales.

Chen said Kaohsiung would no longer be known only as the second largest city in Taiwan, but also the one that hosted the best World Games ever.

She was twice reelected in 2010 and 2014 with about 53% and 68% of the votes respectively.

Chen was criticized for having a nap in her residence while many parts of Kaohsiung were flooded during Typhoon Fanapi on 19 September 2010.

Chen tearfully apologized, saying she felt guilty for taking a rest.

Before assuming her current post, Chen had served as Secretary-General to the President from 2018 to 2020 and Mayor of Kaohsiung from 2006 to 2018, making her the longest-serving mayor of the city since the Japanese occupation of Taiwan.

Nearly a month after she tendered her resignation from the role of Secretary-General to the President, President Tsai Ing-wen nominated Chen, who supports abolishing altogether the Examination Yuan and Control Yuan, as the next President of the Control Yuan on 22 June 2020 amid dissent from the opposition.

Legislative Yuan confirmed the nomination on a 65-3 vote after days of violence in the chamber.

Lawmakers from the Kuomintang and the Taiwan People's Party boycotted the vote whereas all New Power Party lawmakers cast their dissent votes.

The Democratic Progressive Party, which Chen helped to found, temporarily suspended her membership during her tenure as President of the Control Yuan according to party rules.

Chen had expressed hopes of becoming the last President of the Control Yuan after helping to secure passage of the amendments to the Constitution.