Taipei County residents and councilors have criticized the 2010 Taipei County Residents’ Handbook as a propaganda tool for County Commissioner Chou Hsi-wei (周錫瑋) because it only presents his achievements as county commissioner and has too many pictures of him.
Most households in the county have received the 215-page handbook, which includes a 41-page lunar calendar, in the past few days. The handbook provides information on where to find help or services on education, culture, traffic, social welfare and tourism, as well as a variety of services offered by the county government.
A total of 1.4 million copies were printed at a cost of more than NT$40 million (US$1.25 million).
Many residents said the handbook looks more like campaign material for Chou, who plans to run in the year-end local government chief election when Taipei County will be upgraded to a brand-new directly administered city called Sinbei City (新北市), rather than a county resources guide.
There are a total of 48 pictures featuring Chou, presentations on his achievements as county commissioner since 2005 and many passages that begin with “Commissioner Chou thinks” or “after Commissioner Chou took office.”
“I received a ‘Taipei County Residents’ Handbook’ today. I opened it and found 48 Chou Hsi-weis in it,” blogger RainDog wrote in an entry posted on Saturday. “In every chapter — culture and education, social care, tourism and leisure activities, life guide, service guide, county institutions directory — there is [at least] one picture of Chou.”
The blogger then posted all the photos on the blog.
“Of course it’s propaganda material — 48 pictures is really too much,” Kuo Yu-ling (郭鈺靈), who lives in Sijhih (汐止) told the Taipei Times. “It would be more acceptable if there are like two pictures of Chou in a handbook that aims to provide necessary information to county residents.”
Democratic Progressive Party County Councilor Wang Yueh-ming (王月明) said the handbook was a waste of taxpayers’ money because it had only been printed to promote Chou.
“If you really did a good job, the people would know about it,” she said. “It’s really unnecessary to print so many handbooks because you’ll just find them in recycling bins within a few days.”
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) County Councilor Wang Ching-yuan (王景源), however, said the book was not a big deal.
“I’ve been in politics in Taipei County for 24 years, I’ve seen so many county commissioners as well as township mayors print such handbooks to publicize themselves,” he said. “It’s really not a big deal, and it’s only because the election is coming that everyone is focusing on Chou.”
Taipei County Government spokesman Chen Huei-min (陳惠敏) said that the handbook was a way for the county government to communicate with residents and tell them everything they need to know.
“The commissioner appears in so many pictures because he took part in so many events — and even initiated some — in the past four years,” Chen said. “I think the number of pictures of Chou is acceptable given that the handbook has more than 200 pages.”
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