The Taiwan Competitiveness Forum, a think tank composed of academics, yesterday unveiled the results of an online poll that allowed voters to "recommend" legislative candidates they believed should be boycotted, with nine Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) district legislative candidates making the 10-member list.
At a press conference, forum secretary-general Thomas Peng (彭錦鵬) said the final list of "unqualified" candidates was mostly made up of those who had received frequent media exposure and were considered "controversial" by the public.
The names on the list included DPP legislative candidates Wang Shih-cheng (王世堅), Tsai Chi-fang (蔡啟芳), Lin Chung-mo (林重謨), Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇), Pasuya Yao (姚文智), Yu Tien (余天), Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲), Yeh Yi-chin (葉宜津) and Tu Wen-ching (杜文卿) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislative candidate Chang Chin-chung (張慶忠).
Peng said several factors may have contributed to the results, including the DPP's poor record of administrative achievement, DPP officials being found guilty of corruption and the DPP's unpopular handling of the recent controversy over the voting procedure.
Peng said 10,175 people over 20 years of age had taken part in the online poll so far.
He said the results were credible, as the forum had publicized the campaign among voters from across the political spectrum.
The campaign was given equal exposure in three major Chinese-language newspapers -- the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times' sister newspaper), the United Daily News and the China Times -- after the forum was launched early last month, he said.
Peng said DPP legislator-at-large candidates Wang Sing-nan (王幸男), Yu Shyi-kun and Gao Jyh-peng (高志鵬) had often topped the legislator-at-large boycott list in the past four weeks.
"This shows that the party's [legislative] nomination procedure was flawed," he said.
"The public generally believes that the DPP is good at campaigning, but [some of] its great incumbent legislators failed to be nominated by the party this year," Peng said.
When, earlier last month, Peng was asked whether putting the campaign's Web site on the China Times platform might raise suspicions that the campaign was meant to benefit a certain camp, he replied that the China Times only provided the platform but did not interfere.
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
STATS: Taiwan’s average life expectancy of 80.77 years was lower than that of Japan, Singapore and South Korea, but higher than in China, Malaysia and Indonesia Taiwan’s average life expectancy last year increased to 80.77 years, but was still not back to its pre-COVID-19 pandemic peak of 81.32 years in 2020, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The average life expectancy last year increased the 0.54 years from 2023, the ministry said in a statement. For men and women, the average life expectancy last year was 77.42 years and 84.30 years respectively, up 0.48 years and 0.56 years from the previous year. Taiwan’s average life expectancy peaked at 81.32 years in 2020, as the nation was relatively unaffected by the pandemic that year. The metric
RSS