Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairman Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) yesterday dismissed a newspaper report that said he may end his bid for a second term because his deficit against former DPP chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has grown too large to overcome.
The Chinese-language China Times yesterday quoted an anonymous source as saying that Su trailed Tsai by at least 10 percentage points in a possible three-way race for the DPP chairmanship election in May, with former premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) the third aspirant.
If Hsieh dropped out of the race, Su would be more than 20 percentage points behind Tsai, which could mean the end of his political career.
He could be considering dropping out of the race, the source was quoted as saying.
“There is no such thing [as dropping out],” Su said in response to a media inquiry yesterday before the party’s weekly Central Standing Committee meeting.
Pressed further about whether he would keep his name on the list for the chairmanship election, the chairman said: “There is no question about it.”
Su has not formally announced his re-election bid, but gave a strong hint on Feb. 12 about his interest in seeking a second term.
Responding to another question about whether he would be seeking another two-year term to show that he is responsible for the outcome of the year-end seven-in-one elections, Su said: “I think I’m making myself very clear.”
Hsieh, the only aspirant who has made a public announcement about his election bid, reiterated that “division of labor” is much needed for the DPP to regain the public’s trust.
The former premier, a longtime rival of Su, has been advocating a “coalition” with Tsai and saying that if Tsai is eyeing a second run at the presidency, she should focus on her presidential campaign and leave the “dirty work” of managing the party to him.
“For now, I think I am the only candidate who is actually running a campaign because I am the only one with a complete platform... Tsai has not submitted her platform for the [DPP chairmanship] election, which is why I do not think she really has a campaign,” Hsieh told reporters.
Hsieh said he has not heard about the reported rumor that Su would drop out if he withdrew from the election.
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai