Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday that party leaders would meet again soon to discuss national and party issues, particularly the situation in relation to the year-end mayoral and county commissioner elections, once the government has announced its final decision on city and county mergers.
Tsai made the announcement after a meeting of leading DPP figures yesterday.
She summoned a number of party heavyweights to discuss policies and strategies, including former premiers Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) and Frank Hsieh (謝長廷), Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊), senior DPP Legislators Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) and Chai Trong-rong (蔡同榮) and DPP Secretary-General Wu Nai-jen (吳乃仁).
After the meeting, Tsai announced that they had agreed the party must unite in dealing with the upcoming mayoral and commissioner elections, and also for the municipal city mayoral elections next year.
Because the two elections are very close, and choosing candidates for municipal city mayors is new to the party, the party would plan the two elections as one, and hoped to appoint the best candidates for the two elections.
She said the party leaders also agreed the government’s city mergers decision was unfair, and requested that the government propose an amendment to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) and an amendment to Administrative Division Law (行政區域劃分法) as soon as possible.
She said the party’s core value was to help the disadvantaged, and it opposed all government polices that sacrifice the poor in favor of the rich.
The Ministry of Interior announced last week that it had recommended the upgrade of Taipei County to a municipal city and the mergers of Taichung City and county and Kaohsiung City and county.
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