A dispute emerged yesterday over a Central Election Commission decision that the New Party's candidate for Taipei County commissioner, Wang Chien-shien, can only represent one party in the election.
Candidates from the KMT, the New Party and the People First Party (PFP) held a joint press conference yesterday to argue that through the decision, the DPP seeks to obstruct the integration of the three parties. They also said they would petition the Council of Grand Justices for a constitutional interpretation on the issue.
The four candidates, three of which are incumbents, included KMT candidates Ting Shou-chung (
The PFP's Wang says his party and the KMT jointly nominated him for the commissioner's post. His office yesterday said that they haven't decided how to react to the decision, but would decide after discussing the case with their attorneys. Wang's case is a first in Taiwan's electoral history.
Under the Public Officials Election and Recall Law, political parties may nominate candidates for each open public office, but the rules say political parties can only nominate their own members. The commission rejected Wang's request to represent the three opposition parties, but offered to formally hear his objections on Nov. 6.
Chou Yang-san (周陽山), who represented the New Party at the election commission's meeting, emphasized that there were examples of different parties jointly nominating candidates in the US and France and argued that the commission's rule flies in the face of the legislation's underlying intent.
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By refusing to agree spending increases to appease US President Donald Trump, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez threatened to derail a summit that NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte needs to run smoothly for the sake of the military alliance’s future survival. Ahead of yesterday’s gathering in The Hague, Netherlands, things were going off the rails. European officials have expressed irritation at the spoiler role that Sanchez is playing when their No. 1 task is to line up behind a pledge to raise defense spending to 5 percent of GDP. Rutte needed to keep Spain in line while preventing others such as Slovakia
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