A Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City Councilor yesterday accused the city government of forcing other cities and counties to draft budgets and participate in the Taipei International Flora Expo.
Participation in the expo, DPP Taipei City Councilor Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) said, had attracted increasing complaints from cities and counties about being required to budget several million dollars and mobilized staff and students for the event.
Taichung City, for example, budgeted NT$2 million (US$63,000) to send local school students to visit the expo as an extracurricular activity. Changhua County Government will also use part of its annual budget to send schoolchildren to the event and establish an exhibition at the expo.
“The Taipei City Government is using other cities’ and counties’ resources to artificially exaggerate the number of visitors and the economic returns from the expo,” Hsu said at Taipei City Council.
The expo, which officially opens on Nov. 6 and runs through April 30, is expected to attract participation from 62 cities from 33 counties. A total of 12 cities and counties around the nation will have their own exhibitions during the event.
According to the organizers, 8 million visitors, including as many as 800,000 from abroad, are expected to converge on the city for the flower extravaganza.
Taipei City Government paid a NT$3 million subsidy to 12 cities and counties to display local flowers and plants at the expo. However, participants still have to pay millions of dollars to mobilize local residents to visit the expo.
Expo organizing committee spokesperson Ma Chien-hui (馬千惠) said the expo was an international event and that local governments had been invited to display flowers and plants indigenous to their areas at the expo.
She said the subsidy would be used to maintain exhibitions during the event, adding that the organizing committee was not forcing any other local city governments to participate in the flora expo.
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-wong effective from 5:30pm, while local governments canceled school and work for tomorrow. A land warning is expected to be issued tomorrow morning before it is expected to make landfall on Wednesday, the agency said. Taoyuan, and well as Yilan, Hualien and Penghu counties canceled work and school for tomorrow, as well as mountainous district of Taipei and New Taipei City. For updated information on closures, please visit the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration Web site. As of 5pm today, Fung-wong was about 490km south-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan's southernmost point.
Almost a quarter of volunteer soldiers who signed up from 2021 to last year have sought early discharge, the Legislative Yuan’s Budget Center said in a report. The report said that 12,884 of 52,674 people who volunteered in the period had sought an early exit from the military, returning NT$895.96 million (US$28.86 million) to the government. In 2021, there was a 105.34 percent rise in the volunteer recruitment rate, but the number has steadily declined since then, missing recruitment targets, the Chinese-language United Daily News said, citing the report. In 2021, only 521 volunteers dropped out of the military, the report said, citing
A magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck Kaohsiung at 1pm today, the Central Weather Administration said. The epicenter was in Jiasian District (甲仙), 72.1km north-northeast of Kaohsiung City Hall, at a depth of 7.8km, agency data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effects of a temblor, was highest in Kaohsiung and Tainan, where it measured a 4 on Taiwan's seven-tier intensity scale. It also measured a 3 in parts of Chiayi City, as well as Pingtung, Yunlin and Hualien counties, data showed.
Nearly 5 million people have signed up to receive the government’s NT$10,000 (US$322) universal cash handout since registration opened on Wednesday last week, with deposits expected to begin tomorrow, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. After a staggered sign-up last week — based on the final digit of the applicant’s national ID or Alien Resident Certificate number — online registration is open to all eligible Taiwanese nationals, foreign permanent residents and spouses of Taiwanese nationals. Banks are expected to start issuing deposits from 6pm today, the ministry said. Those who completed registration by yesterday are expected to receive their NT$10,000 tomorrow, National Treasury
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