The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has drawn criticism over its decision to not nominate a candidate for Hsinchu County commissioner, choosing instead to support a former commissioner who was expelled from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for running without the party’s nomination.
“In order to win the election, the DPP has chosen to work with a local political faction,” Liao Pen-chuan (廖本全), an associate professor at National Taipei University’s Department of Real Estate and Built Environment, said yesterday.
“However, local factions are only concerned about their own interests — how to maximize their interests, divide the [spoils] and further expand their political influence — and do not care about democracy or rule of law,” he said.
Photo: Huang Mei-chu, Taipei Times
“Therefore, this kind of collaboration is only about winning the election and interests; it would not bring anything fruitful for our democracy — just rot,” the long-time activist said.
Liao was referring to a decision by the DPP’s Central Standing Committee on Wednesday to not nominate a candidate for the Hsinchu County commissioner election on Nov. 29. Instead, it has chosen to collaborate with former Hsinchu County commissioner Cheng Yung-chin (鄭永金), who was expelled from the KMT because he insisted on running despite the party nominating the incumbent commissioner, Chiu Ching-chun (邱鏡淳), for re-election.
Former DPP Hsinchu County commissioner Lin Kuang-hua (林光華), who was defeated by Cheng in his 2001 re-election bid, and again lost to Cheng in 2005, has also agreed to help Cheng in his bid, while Cheng promised to campaign for DPP candidates for the county council.
A voter in Jhubei City (竹北), Hsinchu County, surnamed Huang (黃), also criticized the DPP’s decision.
“The DPP was very critical of the KMT in Hsinchu County, especially when Cheng was the commissioner, so I don’t understand the logic behind its collaboration with the KMT now,” Huang said. “But I’m not surprised at all, this is how politicians and political parties are.”
Eight restaurants in Taiwan yesterday secured a one-star rating from the Michelin Guide Taiwan for the first time, while three one-star restaurants from last year’s edition were promoted to two stars. Forty-three restaurants were awarded one star this year, including 34 in Taipei, five in Taichung and four in Kaohsiung. Hosu (好嶼), Chuan Ya (川雅), Sushi Kajin (鮨嘉仁), aMaze (心宴), La Vie by Thomas Buhner, Yuan Yi (元一) and Frassi in Taipei and Front House (方蒔) in Kaohsiung received a one-star rating for the first time. Hosu is known for innovative Taiwanese dishes, while Chuan Ya serves Sichuan cuisine and aMaze specializes
Taitung County is to launch charter flights to Malaysia at the end of this year, after setting up flights to Vietnam and Thailand, the Taitung County Government said yesterday. The new charter flight services, provided by low-cost carrier Batik Air Malaysia, would be part of five-day tour packages for visits to Taitung County or Malaysia. The Batik Air charter flight, with about 200 seats, would take Malaysian tourists to Taitung on Dec. 30 and then at 12:35pm return to Kuala Lumpur with Taiwanese tourists. Another charter flight would bring the Taiwanese home on Jan. 3 next year, arriving at 5:30pm, before taking the
Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp. (THSRC) plans to ease strained capacity during peak hours by introducing new fare rules restricting passengers traveling without reserved seats in 2026, company Chairman Shih Che (史哲) said Wednesday. THSRC needs to tackle its capacity issue because there have been several occasions where passengers holding tickets with reserved seats did not make it onto their train in stations packed with individuals traveling without a reserved seat, Shih told reporters in a joint interview in Taipei. Non-reserved seats allow travelers maximum flexibility, but it has led to issues relating to quality of service and safety concerns, especially during
STATS: Taiwan’s average life expectancy of 80.77 years was lower than that of Japan, Singapore and South Korea, but higher than in China, Malaysia and Indonesia Taiwan’s average life expectancy last year increased to 80.77 years, but was still not back to its pre-COVID-19 pandemic peak of 81.32 years in 2020, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The average life expectancy last year increased the 0.54 years from 2023, the ministry said in a statement. For men and women, the average life expectancy last year was 77.42 years and 84.30 years respectively, up 0.48 years and 0.56 years from the previous year. Taiwan’s average life expectancy peaked at 81.32 years in 2020, as the nation was relatively unaffected by the pandemic that year. The metric
RSS