Former Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) legislator Huang Wen-ling (黃文玲) yesterday said she had not ruled out running for Changhua County commissioner in November as an independent despite such a move possibly hurting the pan-green camp’s chances of winning the constituency.
“Whether or not a candidate should run in an election should be decided by the voters, not by political parties,” Huang, who was stripped of her TSU membership because she insisted on running, told a press conference.
She had begun preparing her campaign after former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) last year encouraged her to run and her motivation was made even stronger after the Sunflower movement, said Huang, who served as TSU lawmaker from 2012 to this year.
Photo: Lo Pei-der, Taipei Times
Due to TSU headquarters’ insistence that the pan-green camp should only have one candidate, the party suspended Huang’s membership. Huang said she respected the decision.
The Democratic Progressive Party has nominated Legislator Wei Ming-ku (魏明谷) as its candidate in the county.
Huang said she was not concerned about the negative impact of a so-called “pan-green split” if she entered the race, since the county has always been a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) stronghold and her primary goal would be garnering support from independent voters.
Her father, former Changhua County commissioner Huang Shih-cheng (黃石城), supports her decision to run, she said.
Asked if she would accept an “integration mechanism” that select a final pan-green camp candidate between Wei and her by a public opinion poll, Huang Wen-ling said that “it would eventually come down to the people’s decision.”
She pledged government transparency if she was elected, promising that the contents and documents of all government meetings would be released online within 45 minutes of a meeting’s conclusion.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
SPACE VETERAN: Kjell N. Lindgren, who helps lead NASA’s human spaceflight missions, has been on two expeditions on the ISS and has spent 311 days in space Taiwan-born US astronaut Kjell N. Lindgren is to visit Taiwan to promote technological partnerships through one of the programs organized by the US for its 250th national anniversary. Lindgren would be in Taiwan from Tuesday to Saturday next week as part of the US Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ US Speaker Program, organized to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said in a statement yesterday. Lindgren plans to engage with key leaders across the nation “to advance cutting-edge technological partnerships and inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers,”
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UNREASONABLE SURVEILLANCE: A camera targeted on an road by a neighbor captured a man’s habitual unsignaled turn into home, netting him dozens of tickets The Taichung High Administrative Court has canceled all 45 tickets given to a man for failing to use a turn signal while driving, as it considered long-term surveillance of his privacy more problematic than the traffic violations. The man, surnamed Tseng (曾), lives in Changhua County and was reported 45 times within a month for failing to signal while driving when he turned into the alley where his residence is. The reports were filed by his neighbor, who set up security cameras that constantly monitored not only the alley but also the door and yard of Tseng’s house. The surveillance occurred from July
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