Former Green Party Taiwan (GPT) secretary-general Pan Han-shen (潘翰聲) and his brother Pan Han-chiang (潘翰疆) founded the Tree Party (樹黨) last month, and nominated 21 candidates for the Nov. 29 nine-in-one elections, saying that the party would represent the interests of trees and wildlife that do not have the ability or right to vote.
The Pan brothers are familiar faces in Taiwan’s environmental movement, while Pan Han-shen has also run in Taipei city councilor and legislative elections representing the GPT.
However, this time around they founded their own party on Aug. 26, with the objectives to run in the upcoming elections and represent the interests of trees, wildlife and the nation’s youth.
“In recent years, global climate change and the heat-island effect have caused temperature increases that destroy quality of life in the city,” Pan Han-shen said while explaining the idea behind the party.
“For instance, nighttime temperatures in Taipei have gone up by three degrees in the past three decades, which is four times higher than the global average. In addition, fast development have left residents of Taipei with only 6m2 of green land per person, which is much lower than all major Asian cities besides Hong Kong,” Pan Han-shen added.
“Therefore, our goal is not only to break the blue-green political deadlock, but to also break the destruction of trees and wildlife,” he said.
The party has nominated 21 candidates to run for borough warden, village warden, township mayor and city councilor positions in Taipei, New Taipei City, Yilan, Hsinchu, Miaoli and Nantou counties, as well as in Greater Taichung, Chiayi and Greater Tainan.
However, the party’s Taipei City councilor nominee, Kao Yi-hsin (高毅心), 23, was ineligible to be registered as a candidate, since the minimum age threshold for the position is 26.
Pan Ching-chu (潘靜竹), the party’s Greater Tainan city councilor candidate, admitted that it is a big challenge for her to fight for election, given the political environment.
“However, through running in the election I would also advertise my ideas for more transparency in politics and break the polarized blue-green politics in the nation,” she said.
Reacting to the founding of the Tree Party and its nomination of candidates, the GPT said in a statement issued yesterday that it has asked Pan Han-shen and Pan Han-chiang to withdraw from the party.
However, it added that it highly supports the Tree Party’s ideas and would not rule out the possibility of the two parties collaborating in future.
NATIONAL SECURITY: Authorities are working to confirm the identities of the military personnel involved and investigating possible illegal conduct and regulatory violations Authorities are probing possible national security implications after Kinmen police and immigration officers on Sunday found a Chinese woman allegedly posing as a tourist while engaging in prostitution involving more than 10 military personnel. The woman, surnamed Chen (陳), has since been deported, authorities said, adding that investigators are still working to confirm the identities of those implicated, as the records only listed code names and aliases. The case stemmed from a report received by the Kinmen District Prosecutors’ Office on Friday last week from the Jinhu Precinct of the Kinmen County Police Bureau. On Sunday, police, along with the National Immigration
GLOBALGIVING: ‘ Caving to external pressure is not acceptable for an organization that has cultivated justice reform and human rights for 30 years,’ one NGO said A slew of non-government organizations (NGOs) have withdrawn from the GlobalGiving fundraising platform after it announced it would use “Chinese Taipei” instead of “Taiwan” from next month. The Taiwan Good Rice Association wrote on Facebook on Friday that it was informed on April 28 via a teleconference call of the change, which was made because the platform wanted to operate in China. Taiwan Good Rice is to terminate all cooperative relationships with GlobalGiving in response to the platform’s “unilateral and non-negotiable” decision to remove references to Taiwan, the NGO said. “Taiwan is in the official name of Taiwan Good Rice Association and the
HEAVY WEATHER: Typhoon Jangmi is due to crash straight into the Ryukyus as airlines look to shift flights to larger aircraft or cancel flights to Okinawa entirely Taiwan’s international air carriers announced flight adjustments over the weekend as Typhoon Jangmi is forecast to hit the Ryukyu Islands today and tomorrow. The Central Weather Administration (CWA) upgraded Jangmi from a tropical storm to a typhoon at 8am yesterday, with the eye located 580km south of Naha city. It was moving north at 19kph. Today, China Airlines’ CI-120, CI-121, CI-122 and CI-123 flights between Taoyuan and Naha, Okinawa, have been canceled as well as CI-132 and CI-133 between Kaohsiung and Naha. EVA Air’s BR-112, BR-113, BR-186 and BR-185 flights between Taoyuan and Naha are also canceled. Low-cost carrier Tigerair Taiwan canceled IT-230,
MULTIPRONGED APPROACH: China has sought to pressure Palau across a number of fronts, but the island nation has staunchly resisted overtures to ditch Taiwan Palau has been firm in backing Taiwan despite Chinese pressure that uses tourism economics, cyberattacks and criminal infiltration as tools to threaten the Pacific ally into renouncing its recognition of Taiwan as a sovereign state. The Presidential Office yesterday announced that Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) would visit Palau from Saturday to Wednesday next week at the invitation of Palauan President Surangel Whipps Jr. Whipps in April said in an interview that China had outspokenly asked Palau to “denounce Taiwan.” “And we have said: ‘We have no enemies, but nobody tells us who our friends are,’” he said. Whipps has told reporters multiple times
RSS