The KMT will soon contact the PFP to discuss plans to nominate a joint candidate for Kaohsiung mayor, KMT Secretary-General Lin Fong-cheng (
As the year-end Taipei and Kaohsiung mayoral races are the top issue on the KMT's political agenda, the party will try to seek consensus within the party and cooperate with the PFP in order to win, Lin said.
Lin, however, rejected the possibility of a deal in which the KMT would support a PFP candidate for Kaohsiung mayor in exchange for the PFP's backing for Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou's (馬英九) re-election bid.
He said the KMT will only support a PFP candidate if the candidate is proven to be more suitable than the KMT's.
"The party affiliation of the candidate isn't very important. What we need to do is to find the best candidate," Lin said. "If the PFP has a candidate who is superior to the KMT's candidate, the matter is open for discussion."
While Ma's candidacy is almost certain, the KMT is still looking for the right candidate for Kaohsiung mayor. Kaohsiung-elected lawmaker Huang Chao-shun (黃昭順) and Kaohsiung City Council speaker Huang Chi-chuan (黃啟川) are reportedly two possible candidates.
As for the PFP, the party's vice chairman Chang Chao-hsiung (
Other candidates favored by the PFP reportedly include former minister of justice Liao Cheng-hao (
James Chen (
According to Chen, the candidate should meet two major criteria, namely that he or she should be a Kaohsiung resident and be ethnic Taiwanese.
Chen said that by selecting a candidate who is ethnically Tai-wanese, the party hopes to avoid manipulation of the ethnic divide that he said always occurs during election campaigns.
He added that the fact Ma is an ethnic mainlander also makes it important that the party field a candidate of a different background in the south.
Under these circumstances, Wang, an ethnic mainlander, may not be a suitable candidate for Kaohsiung mayor, Chen said.
Unlike the Taipei race, the Kaohsiung election is expected to be an uphill battle for the KMT and PFP as they try to unseat DPP incumbent, Frank Hsieh (
The DPP, meanwhile, is working hard to find a candidate who is strong enough to block Ma's re-election bid in Taipei.
DPP Secretary-general Wu Nai-jen (
Even if it does not succeed in defeating Ma, the DPP will at least deal him a heavy blow, Wu said.
The DPP is reportedly considering having Minister of Justice Chen Ding-nan (
Other possible candidates include Central Personnel Administration Lee Yi-yang (李逸洋), Council for Hakka Affairs Chairwoman Yeh Chu-lan (葉菊蘭) as well as senior lawmakers Shen Fu-hsiung (沈富雄) and Hung Chi-chang (洪奇昌).
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
Taiwan yesterday denied Chinese allegations that its military was behind a cyberattack on a technology company in Guangzhou, after city authorities issued warrants for 20 suspects. The Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau earlier yesterday issued warrants for 20 people it identified as members of the Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM). The bureau alleged they were behind a May 20 cyberattack targeting the backend system of a self-service facility at the company. “ICEFCOM, under Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, directed the illegal attack,” the warrant says. The bureau placed a bounty of 10,000 yuan (US$1,392) on each of the 20 people named in
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
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