A survey conducted on Tuesday by Dailyview.tw — a Web site analyzing the latest trends among Internet users — showed that the approval rating of Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) has plunged to 35 percent, with the site saying that the Taipei City Government’s slow progress on its probe into the “five cases” and its transportation policies are the main factors behind Ko’s decrease in popularity.
The survey, conducted at the behest of the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper), used big data analysis to process 200,000 messages posted by Internet users on social networking Web sites such as the Professional Technology Temple (PTT).
Dailyview chief editor Liu Yan-li (劉彥澧) said the top five sources of negative feedback on Ko were the encumbered investigation into the “five cases,” which Liu said had “petered out,” Taipei’s traffic congestion, Ko’s proposal that people work a makeup day after typhoon days, his scooter parking fee proposal and a scheduled bus fare hike.
Liu said that Ko’s popularity peaked at about 70 percent close to the 100th day after he assumed office and remained mostly stable at about 50 percent in the following six months; but that the mayor’s support rating took a major dip last month.
Ko used to refer to the five cases as the “five cases of malpractice.”
However, he has changed his rhetoric and now calls them the “five cases” after failing to produce evidence of his predecessors’ wrongdoing.
The “five cases” are the Taipei Dome (台北大巨蛋) complex build-operate-transfer project, the MeHas City (美河市) housing project, the Songshan Cultural and Creative Park, the Syntrend Digital Park and the Taipei Twin Towers project (雙子星).
Ko in October last year said that the city’s Clean Government Committee had closed the Twin Towers case after failing to provide evidence that former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) and his officials committed any illegalities in the bidding process for the project.
Ko yesterday refused to comment on his plummeting popularity.
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
NUMBERS IMBALANCE: More than 4 million Taiwanese have visited China this year, while only about half a million Chinese have visited here Beijing has yet to respond to Taiwan’s requests for negotiation over matters related to the recovery of cross-strait tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. Taiwan’s tourism authority issued the statement after Chinese-language daily the China Times reported yesterday that the government’s policy of banning group tours to China does not stop Taiwanese from visiting the country. As of October, more than 4.2 million had traveled to China this year, exceeding last year. Beijing estimated the number of Taiwanese tourists in China could reach 4.5 million this year. By contrast, only 500,000 Chinese tourists are expected in Taiwan, the report said. The report
Temperatures are forecast to drop steadily as a continental cold air mass moves across Taiwan, with some areas also likely to see heavy rainfall, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. From today through early tomorrow, a cold air mass would keep temperatures low across central and northern Taiwan, and the eastern half of Taiwan proper, with isolated brief showers forecast along Keelung’s north coast, Taipei and New Taipei City’s mountainous areas and eastern Taiwan, it said. Lows of 11°C to 15°C are forecast in central and northern Taiwan, Yilan County, and the outlying Kinmen and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties, and 14°C to 17°C
STEERING FAILURE: The first boat of its class is experiencing teething issues as it readies for acceptance by the navy, according to a recent story about rudder failure The Hai Kun (海鯤), the nation’s first locally built submarine, allegedly suffered a total failure of stern hydraulic systems during the second round of sea acceptance trials on June 26, and sailors were forced to manually operate the X-rudder to turn the submarine and return to port, news Web site Mirror Daily reported yesterday. The report said that tugboats following the Hai Kun assisted the submarine in avoiding collisions with other ships due to the X-rudder malfunctioning. At the time of the report, the submarine had completed its trials and was scheduled to begin diving and surfacing tests in shallow areas. The X-rudder,
RSS