Despite predictions from most political observers that "celebrity candidates" would not win many votes, most of the first-time celebrity candidates were elected in yesterday's Taipei City councilor elections.
Among yesterday's 52 elected councilors, all five so-called celebrity politicians were elected, which pundits said could be a sign that "media politics" is likely to have an increasing influence in future elections.
According to Emile Sheng (
In Taipei's first constituency, the PFP's Wang Yu-cheng (
A New Party candidate, Chang Chung-tian (
Another winner in Taipei for the New Party was Hou Kuan-chiung (
In last year's legislative elections, the pro-unification New Party won only one legislative seat, in Kinmen, with 0.44 percent of the vote. All seven sitting lawmakers from the party, including Hsieh Chi-ta (
This time, facing its first election since that defeat, the New Party played it safe and nominated six candidates for the Taipei City councilor elections and just one in Kaohsiung City.
Yesterday's election, in which five of its nominees were elected, showed that the party's nominating strategy appeared to have worked.
Actor Ou-yang Lung (
In the same constituency, another PFP politician fresh on the scene, Wang Shin-yi (
Still, a few of the stars-turned-politicians failed to impress voters yesterday.
For example, the DPP's Aboriginal candidate for the one Aboriginal seat, Chen Yi-hsin (
Hsieh Chien-hui (
Wang Fang-ping (
"No matter how many votes we received, we think we won the election, since we were able to give a voice to [one of] society's difficulties in this campaign," Wang said in a press release last night.
Eight restaurants in Taiwan yesterday secured a one-star rating from the Michelin Guide Taiwan for the first time, while three one-star restaurants from last year’s edition were promoted to two stars. Forty-three restaurants were awarded one star this year, including 34 in Taipei, five in Taichung and four in Kaohsiung. Hosu (好嶼), Chuan Ya (川雅), Sushi Kajin (鮨嘉仁), aMaze (心宴), La Vie by Thomas Buhner, Yuan Yi (元一) and Frassi in Taipei and Front House (方蒔) in Kaohsiung received a one-star rating for the first time. Hosu is known for innovative Taiwanese dishes, while Chuan Ya serves Sichuan cuisine and aMaze specializes
Taitung County is to launch charter flights to Malaysia at the end of this year, after setting up flights to Vietnam and Thailand, the Taitung County Government said yesterday. The new charter flight services, provided by low-cost carrier Batik Air Malaysia, would be part of five-day tour packages for visits to Taitung County or Malaysia. The Batik Air charter flight, with about 200 seats, would take Malaysian tourists to Taitung on Dec. 30 and then at 12:35pm return to Kuala Lumpur with Taiwanese tourists. Another charter flight would bring the Taiwanese home on Jan. 3 next year, arriving at 5:30pm, before taking the
Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp. (THSRC) plans to ease strained capacity during peak hours by introducing new fare rules restricting passengers traveling without reserved seats in 2026, company Chairman Shih Che (史哲) said Wednesday. THSRC needs to tackle its capacity issue because there have been several occasions where passengers holding tickets with reserved seats did not make it onto their train in stations packed with individuals traveling without a reserved seat, Shih told reporters in a joint interview in Taipei. Non-reserved seats allow travelers maximum flexibility, but it has led to issues relating to quality of service and safety concerns, especially during
An exhibition celebrating Taiwan and Japan’s comic culture opened on Saturday in Taichung, featuring a section that explores Taiwanese reproductions of Japanese comics from when martial law limited Japanese representation. “A Century of Manga Culture: An Encounter of Taiwan and Japan’s Youth” held its Taiwan opening ceremony at Taichung’s National Taiwan Museum of Comics after an initial one-month run in Japan’s Kyoto International Manga Museum between May 24 and June 24. Much like the Kyoto exhibition, the show mainly celebrates the comic connection between Taiwan and Japan through late Taiwanese comic book
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