The Central Election Commission yesterday announced that a recall election is to be held for New Power Party (NPP) Executive Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌).
Stability Power Alliance, a group opposed to gay marriage, mobilized for a petition drive to recall Huang, accusing him of neglect of his legislative duties.
The committee said the petition for his recall was signed by 31,922 of the 251,191 eligible voters in New Taipei City’s No. 12 electoral district.
As 26,745 of the signatures were valid, the petition passed the threshold of 25,120 signatures needed to proceed with the recall, the committee said.
The recall election is to be held on Dec. 16, the committee said, adding that it would be the first recall since the threshold was lowered through an amendment to the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act (公職人員選舉罷免法) in November last year.
Huang said that the recall poll would not just be a vote of confidence in him, but represent shared public belief in reform ideas.
“I cordially invite all of my friends to once again come forward and show the force and determination of your shared promotion of reforms,” Huang said, adding that his performance as a politician spoke for itself.
Meanwhile, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) said that he would seek his party’s nomination next year as the candidate in the Taichung mayoral election.
Chiang is the second KMT lawmaker to make a bid for the Taichung race, after KMT Legislator Lu Hsiu-yen’s (盧秀燕) announcement last week.
Chiang said his main goal is to create “a blessed new Taichung” for its residents.
KMT headquarters said that the two hopefuls would have to decide between themselves who should stand as the candidate or allow party members to vote on the issue.
In other election news, KMT Legislator Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) said he had not ruled out seeking the party’s nomination next year for the Taipei mayoral election, but added the KMT should choose former premier Simon Chang (張善政) as its Taipei candidate should he announce his willingness to run.
Chiang Wan-an made the remarks in a radio interview when he was asked if he was interested in running in next year’s Taipei mayoral election.
Chiang Wan-an said he has received mixed opinions on the matter in talks with his constituents, with some people saying that he is inexperienced and trying to dissuade him from campaigning.
Chang is “clear-headed and visionary,” Chiang Wan-an said of his potential opponent.
“Several polls have indicated that he could beat Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲),” the lawmaker said, adding that Chang, an independent, has a large support base among pan-green and pan-blue supporters.
Additional reporting by CNA
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not