Lai Shyh-bao

Lai was born in Taipei, Taiwan, on June 20, 1951. He graduated from National Cheng Kung University with a B.S. in engineering and earned an M.B.A. from National Chengchi University (NCCU). He later taught business administration at NCCU and chaired the graduate school of business administration there.^[1]

Lai completed his graduate studies in the United States at the University of Southern California, where he earned a Master of Science (M.S.) and his Ph.D. in industrial engineering and systems engineering in 1984.^[1] His doctoral dissertation, completed under professors G. A. Fleischer and Ewald Heer, was titled, "A generalized replacement model for a robotic system".^[2]

From 1999 to 2002, Lai was a New Party legislator.^[3][4] Despite a declaration that he would leave the New Party at the end of 2001 but not join another party,^[5] Lai switched affiliations to the Kuomintang in his legislative second term and secured the continued endorsement of the New Party.^[6]

Lai was also promoted to increasingly important KMT caucus positions. In April 2005 he was deputy secretary of the caucus.^[7] By July, Lai had become caucus whip,^[8] a position he held until February 2016.^[9] Lai was nominated as the Kuomintang candidate for speaker of the ninth Legislative Yuan.^[10] The Democratic Progressive Party held a majority in the legislature, and elected Su Jia-chyuan as President of the Legislative Yuan. In 2020, Lai was again nominated for the speakership, losing for a second time, to Yu Shyi-kun.^[11]

In July 2024, Lai hit and injured two pedestrians with his car. The incident came about a year after he had made a Facebook post criticizing a Ministry of Transportation policy to fine drivers who do not keep a distance of 3 meters from pedestrians in the crosswalk.^[12]