The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) will announce this week its candidate for the Yunlin County legislative by-election as well as its candidates for the year-end mayoral and commissioner elections, Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全), head of the party's nominating team, said yesterday.
Following Su's remarks, DPP Yunlin County Councilor Liu Chien-kuo (劉建國) suspended his campaign activities and called on fellow party member, former Yunlin County deputy commissioner Lee Ying-yuan (李應元), to also halt his campaign and wait for party headquarters to make a final decision on who should represent it in the by-election.
The by-election is being held after the Tainan branch of the Taiwan High Court on Tuesday annulled the election victory of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator Chang Sho-wen (張碩文). Chang was declared the winner of the regional legislative seat in Yunlin County in January last year, but his opponent at the time, Liu, accused him of vote-buying and filed a lawsuit seeking to invalidate the election results.
Liu said he was glad to win the lawsuit and that he was willing to take over Chang's legislative seat.
Lee resigned as deputy commissioner shortly after the announcement of the annulment of last year's election.
Lee, who was leading a bike team around the county yesterday as part of his campaign, said the bicycle parade showed his determination to enter the race, but added that he would respect and obey the party's right to choose the candidate.
Su said yesterday the party was mulling asking DPP Legislator Chang Hwa-kuan (張花冠) to enter the Chiayi county commissioner race.
Citing five recent polls conducted by the party, Su said Chang Hwa-kuan led the KMT's candidate — Legislator Wong Chung-chun (翁重鈞) — by 10 percent, suggesting a good chance of defeating Wong.
The party would support former Nantou County commissioner Lin Tsung-nan (林宗男) in the Nantou race, Su added.
Su said Lin, who withdrew from the DPP four years ago after losing the DPP Nantou commissioner primary to then DPP-nominee Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯), could not rejoin the party for five years under DPP regulations.
As such, the DPP could only recommend him, but not nominate him as party candidate, Su said.
The first of 10 new high-capacity trains purchased from South Korea’s Hyundai Rotem arrived at the Port of Taipei yesterday to meet the demands of an expanding metro network, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. The train completed a three-day, 1,200km voyage from the Port of Masan in South Korea, the company said. Costing NT$590 million (US$18.79 million) each, the new six-carriage trains feature a redesigned interior based on "human-centric" transportation concepts, TRTC said. The design utilizes continuous longitudinal seating to widen the aisles and optimize passenger flow, while also upgrading passenger information displays and driving control systems for a more comfortable
Taiwan's first indigenous defense submarine, the SS-711 Hai Kun (海鯤, or Narwhal), departed for its 13th sea trial at 7am today, marking its seventh submerged test, with delivery to the navy scheduled for July. The outing also marked its first sea deployment since President William Lai (賴清德) boarded the submarine for an inspection on March 19, drawing a crowd of military enthusiasts who gathered to show support. The submarine this morning departed port accompanied by CSBC Corp’s Endeavor Manta (奮進魔鬼魚號) uncrewed surface vessel and a navy M109 assault boat. Amid public interest in key milestones such as torpedo-launching operations and overnight submerged trials,
Quarantine awareness posters at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport have gone viral for their use of wordplay. Issued by the airport branch of the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency, the posters feature sniffer dogs making a range of facial expressions, paired with advisory messages built around homophones. “We update the messages for holidays and campaign needs, periodically refreshing materials to attract people’s attention,” quarantine officials said. “The aim is to use the dogs’ appeal to draw focus to quarantine regulations.” A Japanese traveler visiting Taiwan has posted a photo on X of a poster showing a quarantine dog with a
Taiwan’s coffee community has launched a “one-person-one-e-mail” campaign, calling for people to send a protest-e-mail to the World Coffee Championships (WCC) urging it to redesignate Taiwanese competitors as from “Taiwan,” rather than “Chinese Taipei.” The call followed sudden action last week after the WCC changed all references to Taiwanese competitors from “Taiwan” to “Chinese Taipei,” including recent World Latte Art champion Bala (林紹興), who won the World Latte Art Championship in San Diego earlier this month. When Bala received the trophy, he was referred to as representing Taiwan, as well as in the announcement on the WCC’s Web site, until it
RSS