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You hoping it's fourth time lucky

You Ying-lung holds up the registration form for the Hualien County commissioner by-election last week. TAIPEI TIMES FILE PHOTO

You Ying-lung (游盈隆), the DPP's candidate for the Hualien County commissioner by-election, has lost this election twice before but said he treats the bitter taste of the challenges as a tonic.

Six years ago, You represented the DPP for the first time in Hualien County, garnering about 55,000 votes, no mean feat in the traditionally pan-blue constituency. No one from the DPP has won more votes there, and You's tally was about 10,000 more than President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) in the 2000 presidential election.

Encouraged by his relatively strong showing, You ran in the 1998 legislative elections. However, because of an internal split in the DPP, You and another DPP member running in the same constituency, Chen Yung-hsing (陳永興), both lost.

You lost again in a DPP primary for the 2001 legislative elections but accepted a call that year to run in the commissioner election.

You won 32 percent of the vote in a three-way race with the KMT's Chang Fu-hsing (張福興) and the PFP's Lai Cheng-hsiung (賴正雄). The winner, Chang, died of cancer in May, prompting next month's by-election.

You faces two opponents in this election: Hsieh Shen-shan (謝深山), a KMT member also supported by the PFP, and Wu Kuo-tung (吳國棟), a KMT member who has decided to run as an independent after the pan-blue camp passed him over to be their candidate.

With both Hsieh and Wu sharing a similar pan-blue support base, You has as good a chance as any of winning by securing traditional DPP supporters and wooing undecided voters.

You, now in his 40s, is the deputy superintendent of the Ketagalan Institute, founded by Chen.

A former academic, You earned his doctorate in political science from the North Carolina University and taught in the department of political science at the Soochow University before embarking on his political career.

He has been a DPP deputy secretary-general and deputy chairman of the Cabinet's Development and Evaluation Commission.

The DPP called on You to run after an independent candidate the party was supporting pulled out of the race. He initially hesitated, but agreed to run after winning the support of his wife, Shih Chia-ling (施嘉琳).

Shih said she had reservations about the election, mainly because her son had been forced to switch schools frequently as a result of You's participation in elections.

"After three defeats in elections, I promised my son, who is now in the eighth grade and has attended four schools since he was in elementary school, that he could certainly finish junior high school without changing schools again," she said.

"What made us change our minds was that one day, my son came to his father and said `Dad, don't be frustrated with your previous three election failures. Former US president Abraham Lincoln failed more times than you before he was elected the president of America,'" Shih said.

Although he professes a love for the county and a desire to lead it to fulfill its potential, he has been frustrated by his previous failures. After he lost the DPP's primary for the legislative elections in 2001, You blamed the people of Hualien for failing him -- a charge that the opposition camp has been using against You.

"I was in great distress when making that comment and I am willing to apologize to the Hualien people if this remark upsets the Hualien folks," You said on Wednesday when announcing his candidacy.

The DPP has stepped up its efforts to support You in a by-election regarded as a head-to-head duel between the pan-blue and pan-green camps and a preliminary skirmish of next year's presidential election

In a boost to You's campaign, Chen recently pledged that the government would invest about NT$160 million to develop infrastructure in the county.
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