The KMT-PFP alliance yesterday announced that it would nominate former Cabinet secretary-general Hsieh Shen-shan (謝深山) as its representative in the Hualien County commissioner election in August.
Saying that it was a hard decision to make, given the large talent pool in the alliance, KMT Secretary-General Lin Fong-cheng (林豐正) said the alliance decided to nominate Hsieh in the end because of his good image.
"Aside from possessing rich experience in administration and coming out in the lead in polls conducted by the KMT, Hsieh was nominated because of his clean image, good reputation and his chances to score the electoral win" said Lin at a press conference held with his PFP counterpart Tsai Chung-hsiung (蔡鐘雄) following the KMT-PFP alliance meeting.
PHOTO: YU TAI-LANG, TAIPEI TIMES
The decision to nominate Hsieh was decided during the alliance meeting by KMT Lien Chan (連戰) and PFP Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜).
Originally the announcement was to be made by both Lien and Soong. Media speculated that, in order to avoid provoking fellow party members who had failed to secure their party's nomination, both Lien and Soong decided at the last minute to shift the responsibility to the party secretary-general instead.
The Hualien County commissioner by-election will be held on Aug. 2 to fill the post left vacant by the KMT's Chang fu-hsiung (張福興), who died of lung cancer last month.
PHOTO: YANG YI-CHUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
Chang, who started his four-year tenure in December 2001, had 31 more months left in his term.
Lin added that, in the event that Hsieh wins the by-election, Hsieh would serve only the time remaining in Chang's term.
The KMT and the PFP had to iron out their differences in order to reach consensus in nominating Hsieh -- a senior KMT official -- as the alliance's representative in the by-election.
Still another task lies ahead for the KMT to see how successful it can be in dissuading fellow party members from running their independent campaigns.
Noting that there are other pan-blue members who have expressed strong interest in being a candidate, Lin said numerous KMT and PFP party officials would together make a visit to Hualien today to dissuade those other hopefuls from running in the by-election.
That group includes former KMT Hualien County commissioner Wu Kuo-tung (吳國棟) and Liu Chao-eh (劉詔娥), widow of the late commissioner Chang. PFP Legislator Fu Kun-chi (傅崑萁) has also expressed a desire to run
"We strongly hope that fellow party comrades would come to place the interests of the alliance ahead of their personal ones," Lin said.
Despite Lin's call, Wu expressed his determination to run -- even though he had failed to secure the party's nomination.
"There's no turning back, I am determined to run," Wu said.
As of press time, neither Liu nor Fu could be reach for comment.
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching