The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) plans to focus its campaign efforts this week on issues specific to each locality rather than following a centralized election strategy, the DPP said yesterday.
In Kaohsiung the party would address concerns about fake news, in Taichung it would talk about its achievements in the city and infrastructure plans, and in Taipei it would talk about national sovereignty, DPP Deputy Secretary-General Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) said.
Taichung Mayor Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) and Changhua County Commissioner Wei Ming-ku (魏明谷) have proven political track records that are recognized nationwide, and their campaigns would focus on this, Hsu said.
Photo: Chen Yen-ting, Taipei Times
Lin’s administration was responsible for the cleanup of Taichung’s once-polluted Green River (綠川) and Willow River (柳川), the extension of the city’s MRT rail system to Changhua City, and has made great strides with green energy and the city’s World Flora Exposition, Hsu said.
In New Taipei City, allegations of tax evasion brought against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) mayoral candidate Hou You-yi’s (侯友宜) wife have been a boon for DPP mayoral candidate Su Tseng-chang’s (蘇貞昌) campaign, and in Taipei, DPP mayoral candidate Pasuya Yao (姚文智) has been rallying supporters to protect Taiwan’s democracy and sovereignty from Chinese influence, Hsu said.
“If we can hold on to Kaohsiung then the DPP will not have lost, and if we can take New Taipei City, then we have won,” DPP Secretary-General Hung Yao-fu (洪耀福) said on Tuesday last week.
The DPP plans to double the number of staff for canvassing and campaign events this week, with the additional personnel coming from party staff and grassroots supporters, a source within the party said.
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), in her capacity as party chairperson, was yesterday supporting local campaigns in Penghu and Nantou counties, and would visit Taitung County tomorrow, the source said.
On Wednesday evening Tsai would visit Yilan County, and on Thursday evening she would be in Changhua County, the source said, adding that the party has not yet decided on Tsai’s itinerary for Friday, which is the eve of the election.
The party is confident about its campaign in Kaohsiung, and feels that New Taipei City and Taitung are already won, the source said, adding that the situation in Yilan remains unclear.
A fake news report accusing DPP Kaohsiung mayoral candidate Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) of wearing an earpiece during a televised debate on Nov. 10 actually helped his campaign, as it drew attention to the “emptiness” of KMT mayoral candidate Han Kuo-yu’s (韓國瑜) platform, the source said, citing Han’s repeated call for supporters to “have the courage to dream.”
Chen has already attracted investment to Kaohsiung, as electronic component manufacturing company Yageo Corp plans to build a factory in the city, the source said.
The support for civic group We Care’s march on Saturday, calling on Kaohsiung residents to stand up against fake news and to support democracy, has also given the DPP confidence that the city is likely to remain a DPP stronghold, the source added.
Han’s singing of a military song with lyrics urging the “thrusting [of a sword] into the hearts of the enemy” during a campaign event also displeased many Kaohsiung residents, who subsequently joined the We Care march, the source said.
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:
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
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