The staggered arrival times of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Eric Chu (朱立倫) and Deputy Legislative Speaker Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) at a campaign event yesterday revived speculation that the two have yet to patch things up after their fight over the KMT’s presidential candidacy last month.
After taking a backseat in the KMT’s campaigning following her presidential candidacy being rescinded by the party last month, Hung yesterday began her efforts to campaign for the pan-blue camp’s legislative candidates.
She attended two separate campaign events for New Party legislative candidate Pan Huai-tsung (潘懷宗) in Taipei’s Shilin District (士林) and KMT legislative candidate Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) in Taipei’s Zhongshan District (中山).
Photo: CNA
Hung was scheduled to arrive at Pan’s event at 10am, 50 minutes before Chu was due to appear. She also arrived at Chiang’s event 40 minutes prior to Chu’s scheduled arrival time of 11:20am.
When asked if she was deliberately trying to avoid Chu, Hung said that whether the two of them simultaneously attended an event was determined by their schedules and the needs of candidates.
“I am not attempting to avoid Chu. It was the candidates’ arrangement, which was designed to maintain the level of excitement at their events,” Hung said.
“What is the point of arriving at events together, chanting some campaign slogans and then leaving together? Appearing one after the other is the right way to boost candidates’ campaign events,” she added.
The relationship between the two KMT heavyweights has reportedly been tense after Chu replaced Hung as the KMT’s presidential candidate on Oct. 17, a move the deputy legislative speaker decried as impinging upon the party’s democratic mechanisms.
Hung is rumored to be interested in running for the legislative seat representing New Taipei City’s Yonghe District (永和), a constituency in which the KMT has already nominated incumbent Legislator Lin Te-fu (林德福) as its candidate.
However, Hung on Friday said that she would not run for a district legislative seat, because she wants to reinvigorate and bring reform to the KMT. She also turned down the New Party’s offer to list her as one of its legislator-at-large nominees.
At a campaign event in New Taipei City yesterday morning, Chu said he would pay Hung a visit in the near future and that he hoped the two of them could cooperate.
“In the meantime, I would really like to see Deputy Speaker Hung spend more time helping our legislative candidates and attending more of their campaign events,” Chu said.
When asked whether Hung would be invited to the opening ceremonies for his campaign headquarters next week, Chu said all of the party’s heavyweights and senior members would be among the guests, including Hung.
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