The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday made an unofficial commitment to independent Taipei mayoral hopeful Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) that it would not nominate its own candidate in the election and reached an agreement with the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) that only one candidate would represent the pan-green camp in the New Taipei City mayoral election.
DPP Legislator Gao Jyh-peng (高志鵬), who served as convener of a task force for the DPP’s Taipei mayoral primary, issued a joint statement after a two-hour meeting with Ko that the DPP agreed to cooperate with the independent candidate to end the decade-long governance of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in Taipei.
The DPP pledged that it would not ask Ko to join the party should he win the election and that the party would not interfere with Ko’s personnel decisions, Gao said, adding that the 27 DPP candidates in the Taipei councilor elections would support Ko’s campaign.
Photo: Chang Chia-ming, Taipei Times
The meeting, which gathered the National Taiwan University Hospital physician and several DPP officials, including Gao and deputy secretary-general Hung Yao-fu (洪耀福), was held after Ko beat DPP Legislator Pasuya Yao (姚文智) in an opinion poll conducted by the DPP on Friday that aimed to finalize the sole pan-green camp candidate and boost the chances of defeating KMT nominee Sean Lien (連勝文).
The DPP’s decision not to nominate its own candidate in the Taipei mayoral election will not be official until the Central Executive Committee meets tomorrow, but the joint statement has erased any possibility that the party would renege on its promise to work with Ko, which at one point was creating confusion after the announcement of the poll result on Friday.
As part of the reciprocal commitment, Ko agreed to hold talks with DPP candidates in other mayoral and commissioner elections to formulate “shared platforms” and, if he wins the election, take the same positions as DPP mayors and commissioners on major policy discussions.
Ko also pledged to campaign for DPP candidates in the Taipei councilor elections.
Meanwhile, the DPP, led by former party secretary-general Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全), convener of a special committee in charge of seven-in-one elections affairs, held talks with the TSU yesterday and both sides agreed to hold a public opinion survey by the end of this month to determine the final pan-green camp New Taipei City mayoral candidate in a similar format to the Taipei mayoral primary.
Former premier Yu Shyi-kun (游錫堃), the DPP’s candidate for the New Taipei City mayoral election, will compete with TSU Secretary-General Lin Chih-chia (林志嘉) in the primary poll.
The pan-green camp candidate’s rival in New Taipei City remains unclear as New Taipei City Mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫) has yet to announce whether he will seek re-election.
If Chu decides to run for the presidency in 2016, the most likely replacement candidate would be New Taipei City Deputy Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜).
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique