Legislative by-elections will be held in Miaoli County on March 14 and in Taipei City’s Daan District (大安) on March 28. These will be the first two elections since the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) took power in May, which KMT sources said was significant as they are expected to serve as a litmus test of the ruling party’s performance over the past 10 months.
Former KMT legislator Lee E-tin (李乙廷) from Miaoli County lost his seat in the legislature after the Taichung High Court’s December rejection of his appeal against a Miaoli District Court ruling that annulled his election on vote-buying charges in last year’s legislative elections.
Another former KMT lawmaker, Diane Lee (李慶安), resigned last month amid a dispute over her alleged dual citizenship.
The KMT has nominated Lee E-tin’s wife, Chen Luan-ying (陳鑾英), to run in the Miaoli by-election, while seven KMT hopefuls will vie in a party primary to represent the KMT in Daan district.
A senior KMT official said that if the KMT wins the two by-elections, it would show that its support base is solid, but if the result were the opposite, then the party would “have to learn about its deficiencies and address them accordingly.”
“In other words, the party will be able to assess its chances in the year-end mayoral and commissioner election by observing the results of the by-elections,” the official said.
The by-elections would be “a judgment by the voters on the KMT’s performance over the past 10 months,” KMT Legislator Shyu Jong-shyoung (徐中雄) said.
Shyu said the party won overwhelmingly in the two districts in January last year and that if the party’s votes in the by-elections are not as good as last year’s, “we will have to reflect upon ourselves.”
Lee Chin-sung (李錦松), director of the KMT’s Miaoli chapter, said voters were more interested in the slumping economy and have shown little enthusiasm about the by-elections.
Lee said, however, that Miaoli County Commissioner Liu Cheng-hung (劉政鴻) had a high approval rating and that as he was serving as campaign manager for Chen Ruan-ying, it should give her a boost.
Pan Chia-shen (潘家森), director of the KMT’s Taipei chapter, said the party would follow a nomination mechanism based on public opinion polls (70 percent) and party member votes (30 percent) to choose its nominee.
As Diane Lee beat her rival — the Democratic Progressive Party’s Luo Wen-chia (羅文嘉) — 66.8 percent to 32.46 percent last year, Pan said he was sure support for the KMT would still be strong even though the approval rating of the KMT administration as a whole has taken a major hit because of the slumping economy.
EXPANSIONIST: China deploys an average of 40 to 50 warships and coast guard vessels daily in the South China Sea, despite pledges not to militarize the region, an official said China is attempting to expand its influence across the First Island Chain and increase pressure on Japan by sending coast guard vessels into waters off of Taiwan under the pretext of maritime negotiations with Japan and the Philippines, a national security official said yesterday. China’s recent actions in the waters east of Taiwan and Japan and the Philippines’ exclusive economic zones (EEZ) are attempts to establish dominance in First Island Chain waters, said the official who declined to be named, adding that this is “expansion disguised as law enforcement.” Framing China’s actions solely as a cross-strait issue is a serious misjudgment that
Through analyzing fossil evidence, a research team at National Taiwan University (NTU) discovered the largest endemic bird to have lived in Taiwan, naming it Pavo miejue, or extinct peafowl (滅絕孔雀). The Mikado pheasant, which is printed on the back of the NT$1,000 bank note, was previously believed to be the biggest endemic bird to Taiwan. The research team’s findings suggest that Pavo miejue lived during the Pleistocene epoch tens of thousands of years ago. It is the first endemic extinct bird species discovered and formally named in Taiwan. The study was coauthored by NTU Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology professor Tsai Cheng-hsiu (蔡政修),
Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport is to suspend its automated Skytrain service connecting Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 starting on July 1 to facilitate connection works for the upcoming Terminal 3, the airport operator said today. Passengers and staff who need to travel between the two terminals after the suspension can instead use the Taoyuan MRT or the airport's 24-hour shuttle bus service, Taoyuan International Airport Corp said. The Taoyuan MRT Airport Line directly links the two terminals, while the shuttle buses are to operate around the clock, the company added. The Skytrain provides free transportation between the airport’s two terminals for travelers and
Taiwan ranked 42nd in terms of peacefulness among 163 countries, down five places from last year, according to this year’s Global Peace Index. With an overall score of 1.751, Taiwan dropped from 37th last year, the report published by the global Institute for Economics and Peace showed. The overall score measures a country’s level of peacefulness using 23 quantitative and qualitative indicators across three domains — ongoing domestic and international conflict, societal safety and security, and militarization. While Taiwan ranked 42nd worldwide, it was listed in ninth place among the 19 Asian-Pacific countries in the report, after New Zealand, Singapore, Japan, Malaysia,
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